


(Extended) An Analysis of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Trauma

by literally_no_idea



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Captain Marvel (2019) Spoilers, Childhood Trauma, Don't copy to another site, F/M, Gen, Other, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-14
Updated: 2019-05-14
Packaged: 2020-03-05 12:57:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 36
Words: 23,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18829111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/literally_no_idea/pseuds/literally_no_idea
Summary: Hi this is actually an essay but I'm begging you to read it because I spent a week of my life writing this 76 page, 23k word monstrosity and I lost part of my will to live along the way so help me out here





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Hi I'm Phoenix and I really wish I hadn't written this thing but by the time I reached 13k words I realized I couldn't turn back so here we are.
> 
> So uh I'm Phoenix Stebbing, aka tumblr user @tired-disabled-and-in-pain/@mbarku/@fuck-howard-stark, and this is an analysis of the MCU and trauma.
> 
> You can also find it on my google docs [ here](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v48h6a8Q-l3fNc0cLBANOziY1iCcLeSc8_I29x9Fb3g)
> 
> And you can find my tumblr post linking to that google doc [ here](https://fuck-howard-stark.tumblr.com/post/184791716253/extended-the-mcu-and-trauma-an-analysis)
> 
> I am literally begging you to share this thing in one form or another, I'm not normally this needy about it but this took me a week of very little sleep and drained my will to live so I'm being needy this time.

Twenty two movies and eleven years after the release of _Iron Man (2008)_ , the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has accomplished feats previously thought impossible. Fans waited and watched with feverish anticipation as their favorite characters fought enemies from space, other countries, their own organizations, and even the enemies within their own minds. And time and time again, fans laughed, cried, cheered, and screamed as they became more and more invested in this large, complex framework of movies, as they became emotionally invested in the lives and fates of the characters on screen. In this emotional investment, many fans began to see themselves in their favorite characters, and began to root for their favorite characters not just because of their love of the storylines, but because they wanted those characters to have the happy ending they wanted for themselves too.

There has, unfortunately, been one major issue with the MCU’s portrayal of its characters; a consistent avoidance or misrepresentation of characters’ psychological trauma, in one form or another. With the stakes in superhero movies often far exceeding other movies, from the fate of the planet to the fate of the entire universe, and with the consequences of the heroes’ actions being far worse than other movies, where a single mistake can cause the death of trillions of lives, the psychological impact on these characters is far higher as well; because while the heroes’ powers and abilities are far beyond the average human’s, these characters are still often just that; human, or at least capable of the same range of emotions and just as capable of making mistakes. From the trauma that is ignored to the trauma that is blatantly stated on screen, this analysis seeks to evaluate the way that trauma has been discussed in the MCU, and hopes to shed some light on both what went wrong as well as what went right along the way. This analysis will be delving into the trauma of as many characters as possible, though as is the case in any analysis, there are sure to be traumas that will be mistakenly forgotten or excluded. This does not mean that those traumas are invalid, but rather anything forgotten is a mistake on the part of the author, nothing more.


	2. Tony Stark

As the MCU’s first character, Tony Stark has been characterized very differently as his values and ideas changed with him over the course of 22 movies; while parts of his trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have been characterized appropriately, his trauma has often been dismissed, trivialized, or swept aside in favor of focusing on other plots. In _Iron Man (2008)_ , we are introduced to the irresponsible, heavy drinking and party-loving Tony Stark, who blows off awards ceremonies and builds weapons of mass destruction in the same breath. He’s a character we’re willing to love and hate in equal measure; his suave personality, his smooth arrogance and his playboy tendencies leave us believing that he’s just one more kid who grew up rich with his dad’s money and never learned responsibility or empathy.

However, there’s a lot more to Tony Stark, and as we see his true personality underneath the facade he presents to the world, we see a man who is broken, with low self esteem and a history of self destructive tendencies. We really start to see this in _Iron Man 2 (2010)_ , when he and Nick Fury are talking about his father, Howard Stark. Fury asks Tony what he remembers about his father, and Tony says:

> He was cold, calculating, never told me he loved me, never even told me he liked me, so it's a bit hard for me to digest that he said the whole future is riding on me thing, I don't get that! You're talking about a man whose happiest day of his life was shipping me off to boarding school. ( _Iron Man 2_ )

This is our first insight into Tony’s childhood on screen, and it paints a negative picture of Howard Stark. In scene, Fury denies this, and, throughout the MCU, we often see Howard referenced as a good man and a good father, something that Tony himself clearly never believed.

In the MCU tie-in comic _Iron Man 2: Public Identity_ , Howard is clearly shown to be emotionally and verbally abusive to a young Tony, yet in the movies, he is continually treated as a good man. In itself, this isn’t unusual; abusers are often seen as good people by those who are close to them, while their victims suffer in silence. In _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we finally get to see Howard and Tony talk to each other, and Tony seems to be quickly willing to forgive his father, going so far as to hug him, even though Howard doesn’t know who Tony really is. Once again, this isn’t unusual for an abuse victim; many abuse victims are desperate to forgive their abusers and cling to their relationship with their abusers as a result of something called “trauma bonding”: 

> A trauma bond is a bond that forms due to intense, emotional experiences, usually with a toxic person. Similar to Stockholm Syndrome, it holds us emotionally captive to a manipulator who keeps us “hostage” – whether that be through physical or emotional abuse. (Arabi)

While Tony’s reaction is understandable, with the rest of the MCU’s fervent denial of Howard’s abusive behavior, it certainly comes off as if Tony was simply overreacting the whole time, a mindset which can be incredibly damaging to other victims/survivors of emotional and verbal abuse.

Tony’s next major experience of trauma after his childhood abuse is when he is kidnapped and tortured in Afghanistan. In _Iron Man (2008)_ , we see Tony Stark tortured by having his head dunked in a bucket of water repeatedly until he agrees to build weapons for his captors. Tony refuses, and it’s only when he hears Virginia “Pepper” Potts’ voice calling his name and sees a glimpse of the large arc reactor in his mind’s eye that the torture stops as Tony pretends to agree to build weapons for them. After ‘agreeing’ to build the missile, he creates the miniature arc reactor for himself with Ho Yinsen’s help, and spends the time talking to Yinsen and learning about Yinsen’s life and family. He escapes with Yinsen’s help, but Yinsen dies, leaving Tony with the line “Don't waste it... don't waste your life, Stark” ( _Iron Man_ ). Tony makes it back to the United States, and announces to the press an end to Stark Industries’ involvement with weapons making. The entire experience is multiple traumas piled on top of one another, and one would think that these traumas would become a constantly recurring theme in Tony’s life. One would be completely wrong. As the rest of the movie continues, Tony appears to experience no significant psychological effects from Yinsen’s death, the pain of the arc reactor, or the repeated torture by his captors. There are no on screen references to significant trauma-related effects. Also in _Iron Man (2008)_ , we watch as Tony discovers that Obadiah Stane betrayed him, and was in fact the one behind his capture in the first place. We watch as Stane takes the arc reactor directly out of Tony’s chest, and as Tony almost dies fighting him. Once again, we do not see any significant trauma symptoms following these events, both in _Iron Man (2008)_ itself and in all the movies with Tony Stark that follow.

In _Iron Man 2 (2010)_ , the role of trauma starts to come in and out of play, sometimes being portrayed accurately, sometimes being brushed aside in the midst of everything. We find a dying Tony doing his best to figure out what to do with his remaining time without alerting anyone to a change in behavior. He makes Pepper CEO of Stark Industries, fights with James “Rhodey” Rhodes until Rhodey takes the Mark II suit, throws a huge party, and holds the first Stark Expo in years. This is one of the MCU’s good representations of trauma; when someone is dying, it’s not uncommon for them to exhibit more reckless behavior, and with Tony’s trauma history, it would make sense that he might feel like a bother by asking for help or explaining what’s wrong. He might also feel an obligation to protect those closest to him from feeling guilty about his death, and by lashing out, he can prevent them from mourning him as deeply.

Another good example of trauma in the MCU is the aftermath of Tony’s journey through the wormhole in _The Avengers (2012)_. We see him in _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ working in his workshop, with JARVIS saying “Sir, may I remind you that you’ve been awake for nearly 72 hours?” ( _Iron Man 3_ ). We also see him talking to Pepper about the battle of New York, saying: 

> You experience things and then they're over, and you still can't explain them. Gods, aliens, other dimensions. I'm just a man in a can. The only reason I haven't cracked up is probably because you moved in. Which is great. I love you. I'm lucky. But honey, I can't sleep. You go to bed, I come down here. I do what I know. I tinker. I... Threat is imminent. And I have to protect the one thing that I can't live without. That's you. And my suits, they're, uh... Machines. They're part of me. ( _Iron Man 3_ )

Both of these experiences show the audience how Tony is coping after the wormhole; he’s having insomnia, when Pepper does manage to get him to come to bed he has nightmares, he sees himself as weak and vulnerable to the world, and is scared that he’ll lose Pepper, a fear that only becomes more realistic later in the movie.

We also see Tony having a panic attack while signing a drawing for a young girl of him flying towards the wormhole, at the same time that Rhodey is talking about the battle of New York and the girl’s younger brother is asking him “How did you get out of the wormhole?” ( _Iron Man 3_ ). This is another great example of trauma. Reminders of the trauma, even vague ones, can cause intense reactions, from panic attacks to anger outbursts, and in this case we see Tony panicking. He leaves the building and enters the Iron Man armor for JARVIS to run diagnostics, asking about poison or a heart problem only for JARVIS to diagnose his symptoms as a severe anxiety attack. This is also common in trauma survivors; many survivors initially assume that their symptoms are indicative of a physical health condition, such as a heart attack, when it is, in fact, a result of anxiety. Later in _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ we see Tony having another panic attack on the way to stop the Mandarin, where we get this dialogue between Tony and Harley Keener, the boy who helped him after the armor crashed in Tennessee:

> Tony: God, what am I gonna do?
> 
> Harley: Just breathe. Really, just breathe.
> 
> Harley: You’re a mechanic, right?
> 
> Tony: Right.
> 
> Harley: You said so.
> 
> Tony: Yes, I did.
> 
> Harley: Why don’t you just build something?
> 
> ( _Iron Man 3_ )

At this point, Tony starts to calm down, and gets back in the car, driving off to get supplies from a hardware store. This is another good example of trauma in the MCU; when a person is having a panic attack, one of the best things you can do for them is to try and help ground them and focus their attention on something that they enjoy or something calming. A common tactic is to have people identify all the objects of a certain color in the room, ask them to name everything in the room they can see, or have them count breaths with you, slowing down their breathing if they’re hyperventilating. For Tony, his mind already works far faster than most people’s, so it would be important to get his brain focused on something complicated and interesting enough to keep his focus, but easy enough to not overwhelm him. When Harley suggests that Tony build something, this is an almost perfect solution, because it’s something that Tony already excels at and it also gives him a challenge to work on.

 _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ is perhaps the one movie in the MCU that most accurately represents trauma; we see more of this trauma when his former personal bodyguard Harold “Happy” Hogan is injured after pursuing one of the people with Extremis, and Tony leaves after visiting him in the hospital and is confronted by reporters asking for his statement on the attack, with this heated exchange between Tony and one of the press: 

> [Stark approaches his car, flanked by news reporters. One videographer behind him points his smartphone at him]
> 
> Videographer: Hey Mr. Stark. When is somebody going to kill this guy? Just sayin'.
> 
> [Stark turns around to face the videographer]
> 
> Tony Stark: Is that what you want?
> 
> [pauses]
> 
> Tony Stark: Here's a little Holiday greeting I've been wanting to send to the Mandarin. I just didn't know how to phrase it until now. My name is Tony Stark and I'm not afraid of you. I know you're a coward, so I decided... that you just died, pal. I'm gonna come get the body. There's no politics here, it's just good old-fashioned revenge. There's no Pentagon. It's just you and me. And on the off-chance you're a man, here's my home address: 10880 Malibu Point, 90265. I'll leave the door unlocked. That's what you wanted, right?
> 
> [Stark grabs the smartphone and throws it against a column before entering his car]
> 
> Tony Stark: Bill me.
> 
> ( _Iron Man 3_ )

In this scene, we see Tony, angry at himself for not taking Happy’s concerns more seriously and now worried about Happy’s health, take out this anger on the videographer, simultaneously lashing out and also recklessly announcing his address, leaving himself vulnerable to attack.

Tony continues to experience trauma in _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ , watching Pepper be injected with Extremis while he’s being held captive, watching Aldrich Killian kill Maya Hansen, finding out that Rhodey is also being held captive by Killian, and then seeing Pepper fall when he promised he would catch her, at the time not knowing that she had survived the fall. We see these traumas take their toll on Tony, as he realizes that he’s putting the people closest to him at risk by being Iron Man, and at the end of the movie, he destroys all of his suits and goes into surgery to have the shrapnel removed from his chest so that he’ll no longer be dependent on the arc reactor. It’s a really impactful moment, as we see Tony start to take measures to protect himself and those he loves. While these traumas get largely brushed aside in future movies in the MCU - which is, once again, a problem - we do get to see some great examples of trauma and its effects in _Iron Man 3 (2013)_.

 _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ is entirely based around Tony’s fear of another alien invasion, fueled by Wanda Maximoff manipulating him into seeing the rest of the Avengers team dead because he didn’t do enough to help them, to protect the world. However, while this trauma is central to the plot of the movie, we see many of the other characters brush aside Tony’s fears as nothing more than paranoia. Again, this is not necessarily unusual for people with trauma; their fears are often considered irrational and unreasonable, and others around them are more likely to dismiss their fears out of hand rather than trying to comfort or support the traumatized person. In _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ , as a result of Tony’s fear, he unintentionally creates Ultron, and when the team finds out, they confront him and accuse him of not trusting the rest of the team, of being unreasonable. Right after Ultron escapes from the tower, we see this dialogue between Thor Odinson, Tony, and Bruce Banner:

> Thor: [sees Tony laugh] You think this is funny? This could have been avoided if you hadn't played with something you don't understand...
> 
> Tony Stark: I'm sorry... I think it's funny, I think it's a hoot that YOU don't get why we need this!
> 
> Bruce Banner: Tony, maybe this might not be the time…
> 
> ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ )

In this scene, it’s clear to Tony why they needed something like Ultron; the attack on New York was just the beginning, and Earth is vulnerable to another attack from space. However, all Thor and the rest of the team sees is the fact that with the scepter’s influence, Ultron became something far beyond what Tony and Bruce had programmed him to be. They see Tony as overreacting, trying to use fear to prevent something that they don’t think will happen. Tony’s fears are dismissed as overreaction, and his actions are viewed as unreasonable, irrational, and lying to the rest of the team. We also see this mistrust later in a conversation between Steve Rogers and Tony on Clint Barton’s family’s farm:

> Tony Stark: You know Ultron is trying to tear us apart, right?
> 
> Steve Rogers: Well I guess you'd know. Whether you tell us is a bit of a question.
> 
> Tony Stark: Banner and I were doing research.
> 
> Steve Rogers: That would affect the team.
> 
> Tony Stark: That would end the team. Isn't that the mission? Isn't that the "why" we fight, so we can end the fight, so we get to go home?
> 
> Steve Rogers: Every time someone tries to win a war before it starts, innocent people die. Every time.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ )

Once again, we see other members of the team, this time Steve, treat Tony like he’s being unreasonable, and causing more harm than good by working on something like Ultron. If the team had taken the time to address why Tony was having these concerns, it’s possible that future problems could have been avoided. While in universe it makes sense that the others didn’t believe him, it does make it hard for the audience to see past the team’s judgements to understand why Tony was doing what he was doing.

The next movie where we really see Tony’s traumas come up is in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , and once again, Tony’s traumas are dismissed or belittled by the other heroes. We watch as Rhodey gets shot out of the sky in the battle at the airport, as Tony rips off the faceplate to the War Machine armor, holding his unconscious best friend in his arms in the crater caused by the armor’s impact with the ground. While a lot of attention is paid in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ to James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes and Steve’s friendship and the lengths Steve is willing to go to protect his friend, very little time is paid to Tony and Rhodey’s friendship and Tony’s explanation of why agreeing to the Accords is important, of the measures he’s taken in the past to try and prevent this from happening in the first place. A more in-depth discussion about Rhodey’s injury in the airport battle will take place later in this analysis; for now we’re going to continue looking at Tony’s traumas, but fear not, we will get back to Rhodey.

In _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , we also get possibly two of the most important betrayals or relationship conflicts in the MCU: Steve’s betrayal of Tony and refusal to reason with him, and the revelation that Tony’s parents weren’t killed in a car crash, but by Bucky on a mission as the Winter Soldier. This is important, because Tony already has a long trauma history, including being lied to and/or betrayed by the people closest to him, like Obadiah Stane. This is another time where trauma is fairly well represented, but the other characters treat Tony’s trauma as trivial in comparison to their own. Had Steve trusted Tony enough to tell him the truth about his parents’ deaths before it was revealed to him with Bucky in the same room, Tony would undoubtedly have reacted differently, and had time to process this information without making any rash decisions. However, because Steve chose to lie to Tony, Tony doesn’t get time to process this, and instead, motivated by anger and grief, attacks Bucky and Steve. This is especially poignant considering Steve’s earlier words to Tony in _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ in which Steve says “Sometimes my teammates don't tell me things”  ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ ). Without this hypocritical thinking being brought up, and without considering the background Tony is coming from, it’s easy to just see Tony as overreacting to something that Bucky wasn’t in control of, when it actually stems from deeper issues as well. To make matters worse, Steve directly chooses Bucky over Tony, then proceeds to break Tony’s helmet off with his shield and jam the shield into Tony’s arc reactor, an action that would very likely have caused Tony to have flashbacks to when Stane pulled the arc reactor directly out of his chest. Once again, we don’t see any references to these past traumas that would have given so much insight into Tony’s actions, and we are left with a scene that seems to prefer Steve’s side of the story.

The next movie where we see Tony’s trauma mentioned again is _Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)_ , where Tony is doing his best to help Peter Parker, and to act as a better father figure than Howard had been to Tony. We get some more subtle references to Tony’s childhood, and we get our first glimpse into how much Tony cares about Peter: 

> Peter Parker: Is everyone okay?
> 
> Tony Stark: No thanks to you.
> 
> Peter Parker: No thanks to me? Those weapons were out there and I tried to tell you about it, but you didn't listen. None of this would've happened if you had just listened to me! If you even cared, you'd actually be here.
> 
> [Tony Stark steps out of the suit to reveal that he is in fact there]
> 
> Tony Stark: I did listen, kid. Who do you think called the FBI, huh? Do you know that I was the only one who believed in you? Everyone else said I was crazy to recruit a fourteen-year-old kid.
> 
> Peter Parker: I'm fifteen.
> 
> Tony Stark: No, this is where you zip it, alright? The adult is talking! What if somebody had died tonight? Different story, right? 'Cause that's on you. And if you died, I feel like that's on me. I don't need that on my conscience.
> 
> Peter Parker: Yes sir. I...
> 
> Tony Stark: Yes.
> 
> Peter Parker: I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
> 
> Tony Stark: Sorry doesn't cut it.
> 
> Peter Parker: I understand. I just-I just wanted to be like you.
> 
> Tony Stark: And I wanted you to be better. Okay, it's not working out. I'm gonna need the suit back.
> 
> ( _Spider-Man: Homecoming_ )

We see just how much Tony cares about Peter, and we also see how much faith he has in Peter. He wants Peter to be even better than he is, and we finally start to understand why Tony had put so many restrictions on Peter’s suit and put a tracker in it; because he wanted to make sure that Peter would be safe, that nothing would happen to Peter if Tony could prevent it. While these actions aren’t necessarily reasonable, they are motivated by fear and trauma; Tony has seen what happened to the people he cares about when he couldn’t be there to help, and he doesn’t want that to happen to Peter, who’s still just fifteen years old.

In that conversation we also get this line from Tony when Peter says he’s nothing without the suit: “If you're nothing without this suit, then you shouldn't have it, okay? God, I sound like my dad” ( _Spider-Man: Homecoming_ ), and a little earlier in the movie, we also hear Tony talk about his father, saying “My dad never really gave me a lot of support and I’m trying to break the cycle of shame” ( _Spider-Man: Homecoming_ ). We see how much resentment Tony held towards his dad, and how he’s trying to be better to Peter than Howard was to Tony. Once again, however, these issues and concerns on Tony’s part are belittled and shown as Tony just being unreasonable, and Tony’s own resentment towards his dad is completely disregarded in favor of him forgiving his father in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_. As has been previously mentioned in this analysis, that kind of reaction as a result of trauma bonding isn’t uncommon, but to those unfamiliar with this it certainly serves to make Tony’s trauma look irrelevant on screen.

Tony’s concerns about Peter’s safety in _Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)_ comes to a head in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , when he watches Peter die in his arms as a result of Thanos’ snap. We see Tony look absolutely devastated by this, and it’s not until _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , when Tony is stumbling off of the Benetar, that we hear him say “I lost the kid” ( _Avengers: Endgame_ ). We then see Tony five years later, after Scott Lang, Steve, and Natasha Romanoff have come to talk to him about their time travel plan and he tells them no, that he picks up the photo of him and Peter, and he starts actually running scans to see if there’s any possible way that the time travel plan could work. Despite having spent the last five years with Pepper and their daughter, Morgan Stark, he still cares about Peter, and is willing to do what he must to try and get Peter back.

In both _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ and _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we also get reprises of Tony’s trauma regarding the wormhole, possible threats from space, and the fight with Steve in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , and in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ we see Tony almost dead, weak from starvation, dehydration, and limited oxygen on the Benetar. In _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , we see Tony and Stephen Strange arguing about what to do regarding Thanos:

> Stephen Strange: I don’t think you quite understand what’s at stake here.
> 
> Tony Stark: What? No. It’s you who doesn’t understand that Thanos has been inside my head for six years. Since he sent an army to New York and now he’s back! And I don’t know what to do. So I’m not so sure if it’s a better plan to fight him on our turf or his, but you saw what they did, what they can do. At least on his turf, he’s not expecting it.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ )

Here, we see Tony’s trauma regarding the wormhole brought up again, and this is one of the times that trauma is brought back up from previous MCU movies, and it’s done really well; Tony’s panicked, angry, and desperate, because the very thing he’s been scared would happen has now happened, and he doesn’t know what to do at this point. This gets brought up again in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ along with Steve’s betrayal from _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ in this scene with Tony, still just barely recovering from being on the Benetar: 

> Steve Rogers: We've been hunting Thanos for three weeks now - through face scans and satellites, so far we've got nothing. Tony, you fought him...
> 
> Tony Stark: What are you talking about? I didn't fight him. No, he wiped my face with a planet while the wizard gave away the store. That's what happened, there's no fight...
> 
> Steve Rogers: Okay, did he give you any clues, any coordinates?
> 
> Tony Stark: I saw this coming a few years back, I had a vision, but I didn't want to believe it. Now it's true.
> 
> Steve Rogers: Tony, I'm going to need you to focus...
> 
> Tony Stark: I needed you, as in past tense. That trumps what you need. It's too late, buddy. Sorry. You know what I need? You know what I need? I need a shave. I don't believe I ever remember telling you this...
> 
> James Rhodes: Tony, Tony...
> 
> Tony Stark: What we needed was a suit of armor around the world! Remember that? Whether it impacted our precious freedoms or not, that's what we needed!
> 
> Steve Rogers: Well, that didn't work out, did it?
> 
> Tony Stark: I said we'd lose. You said, "we'll do that together too." Guess what, Cap? We lost, and you weren't there. But that's what we do, right? Our best work after the fact? We're the Avengers? Not the Prevengers, right?
> 
> James Rhodes: Okay, you made your point, Just sit down, okay?
> 
> Tony Stark: No, no, here's my biggest point, he said...
> 
> James Rhodes: Just sit down, okay?
> 
> [Tony points at Carol Danvers]
> 
> Tony Stark: We need you, you're new blood. Bunch of tired old wheels! I got nothin' for you, Cap! I've got no coordinates, no clues, no strategies, no options! Zero, zip, nada. No trust - liar.
> 
> [rips off his reactor]
> 
> Tony Stark: Here, take this. You find him, and you put that on him. You hide -
> 
> [collapses mid sentence]
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

This is quite possibly the most painful scene in the MCU, and it’s the culmination of years of pain and suffering for Tony. It refers back to scenes and lines from _The Avengers (2012)_ , _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ , and _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , calling up some of Tony’s worst trauma memories: the wormhole, being the cause of other people’s deaths and watching those around him die but him still being alive, and being lied to and betrayed by those around him. In the midst of all the pain and weakness Tony is experiencing in this moment, he is still emotional enough that he is willing to sacrifice what little strength he has left to say what he feels he needs to say. We also see Tony in this scene ripping off the reactor and shoving it into Steve’s hands, reminiscent of the way Steve had broken Tony’s reactor with his shield in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ and the way that Obadiah Stane had ripped the second arc reactor out of Tony’s chest in _Iron Man (2008)_.


	3. Steve Rogers

Both a war veteran and a man out of time, Steve Rogers understandably has significant trauma and PTSD, yet this trauma only seems to be addressed very briefly in _The Avengers (2012)_ , then never discussed again. In _The Avengers (2012)_ , we see Steve Rogers hitting a punching bag as memories flash on screen, jumping between images of Steve in the gym and memories from the war and the crash of the Valkyrie. Steve eventually hits the bag hard enough to send it flying across the room. When Fury enters the room and asks if Steve’s having trouble sleeping, Steve replies “I've been asleep for 70 years. I think I've had enough rest” ( _The Avengers_ ). Steve also tells Fury “When I went under, the world was at war. I wake up, they say we won. They didn't say what we lost” ( _The Avengers_ ). This scene shows us classic symptoms of PTSD: flashbacks and unwanted memories, insomnia, irritability or aggression, and negative thoughts and assumptions about the world. While this scene shows us these classic symptoms of PTSD, we see almost nothing else about this in the rest of the MCU, and it’s as if Steve’s trauma blends into the background, unimportant and no longer affecting Steve in any significant way. PTSD does not simply go away with time; it often takes years of therapy and support to help mitigate symptoms, and even then people with PTSD often have to continue to actively work towards maintaining healthy coping mechanisms and continuing exposure therapy around situations that remind them of their trauma. The decision not to mention Steve’s trauma again after that scene quite frankly does a disservice to individuals with PTSD.

In addition to Steve’s trauma from the war in general, he also experiences a significant amount of guilt about his failure to protect Bucky from falling from the train in _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_ , and his failure to find Bucky and help him afterward, something that causes him to take extreme measures to help Bucky in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_. In _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_ , we see Steve grieving Bucky’s death sitting in a small bar by himself, where Margaret “Peggy” Carter finds him and they start the following conversation:

> Steve Rogers: Dr. Erskine said that the serum wouldn't just affect my muscles, it would affect my cells. Create a protective system of regeneration and healing. Which means, um, I can't get drunk. Did you know that?  
>   
>  Peggy Carter: Your metabolism burns four times faster than the average person. He thought it could be one of the side effects.
> 
> Peggy Carter: It wasn’t your fault.
> 
> Steve Rogers: Did you read the report?
> 
> Peggy Carter: Yes.
> 
> Steve Rogers: Then you know that’s not true.
> 
> Peggy Carter: You did everything you could.
> 
> [A pause.]
> 
> Peggy Carter: Did you believe in your friend? Did you respect him?
> 
> [A pause.]
> 
> Peggy Carter: Then stop blaming yourself. Allow Barnes the dignity of his choice. He damn well must have thought you were worth it.
> 
> ( _Captain America: The First Avenger_ )

Despite Peggy’s words, Steve still clings to Bucky and, when he recognizes him in _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , he goes out of his way to find Bucky again and help him, refusing to fight him at the end even as Bucky hits him repeatedly, knocking him out and then pulling him out of the water and leaving Steve on the shore. When Bucky is suspected of a terrorist attack in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , Steve goes out of his way to help Bucky escape, trying to get him to safety and away from the various world governments until they can prove Bucky’s innocence. Steve’s loyalty to Bucky is also the reason for the fight between Bucky, Steve, and Tony at the end of _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , and the reason that Steve drops and leaves behind the shield when Tony claims it’s not Steve’s to keep, it’s Howard’s. Steve’s entire decades-long dedication to Bucky, however, seems to be entirely thrown out in the plot of _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_. While Steve undeniably has a strong connection with Peggy, it’s hard to believe that, after having quite literally disregarded over a hundred countries’ wishes, Steve would suddenly turn his back on Bucky entirely and go back in time to live with Peggy without giving Bucky any warning whatsoever.

We also see Steve trying to cope with Sharon Carter having lied to him in _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , and attending Peggy Carter’s funeral in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_. When Steve is adjusting to learning about Sharon Carter’s identity in _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , he reacts with a front of cold indifference, greeting her in the hallway at SHIELD simply as “neighbor,” a reaction that’s understandable for someone that puts so much value in honesty. Steve does get over Sharon’s lying fairly quickly, probably because he recognizes why she had to do it in the first place. When Steve is coping with Peggy’s death in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , he appears to use her death, and Sharon’s eulogy in particular, as further justification for not signing the Accords, emboldened by what he feels is right and allowing his emotions to blend together until it’s difficult to tell what emotions come from where. However, in following the storyline with Bucky and the Accords, Peggy’s death gets brushed aside and forgotten in the midst of everything else.


	4. Bruce Banner

While Tony and Steve’s trauma were at least briefly mentioned, Bruce Banner’s trauma is almost not discussed at all, despite the fact that his trauma plays a key role in his character. While not explicitly stated, it is fairly clear in the Earth-616 comics that due to childhood abuse by his father, Bruce Banner developed Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), with the Hulk being another personality or alter that was meant to protect Bruce from his trauma. Later in life, when the gamma radiation explosion occurred, the Hulk took the blast for Bruce, and as a result the Hulk has the mutations caused by the gamma radiation but Bruce does not. In the MCU, this storyline is completely ignored, with absolutely no references made to Bruce’s childhood trauma whatsoever, and the Hulk’s existence not explained in any detail. The closest references to Bruce’s trauma are in _The Avengers (2012)_. A conversation between Tony Stark and Bruce Banner gives us this dialogue: 

> Tony Stark: Hey, I've read all about your accident. That much gamma exposure should have killed you.  
>    
>  Bruce Banner: So you're saying that the Hulk... the other guy... saved my life? That's nice. It's a nice sentiment. Save it for what?
> 
> ( _The Avengers_ )

In this dialogue, we once again don’t get any clear indication of Bruce’s trauma, but another veiled reference to the idea that the Hulk was there to protect Bruce. The other reference to Bruce’s trauma is when they’re discussing the cell that Loki was put in, and Bruce describes the cell being built for:

> In case you needed to kill me, but you can't! I know! I tried!... I got low. I didn't see an end, so I put a bullet in my mouth... and the other guy spit it out! So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good, until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk! ( _The Avengers_ )

In this case, we see not only that Hulk is trying to keep Bruce alive, but also that Bruce is so tired, overwhelmed, and self-hating that he tries to commit suicide. However, throughout the MCU, no time or attention is paid to why Bruce felt so helpless, or what else was going on in his life that made the Hulk happen. With Bruce and Hulk being such a clear example of the possible effects of childhood trauma and abuse and with the way their existence as a DID system could have helped bring positive attention to people with DID, it’s truly upsetting that the MCU chose not to use this opportunity to show support for people with such a misunderstood and stigmatized disorder.

One of Bruce’s traumas that is briefly discussed on screen but then quickly forgotten again is his loss of Natasha in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_. In _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ , we see a budding relationship forming between Bruce and Natasha, and in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ we get a short reunion scene after Bruce arrives back on Earth. However, after Natasha’s death in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we see Bruce as Professor Hulk throw a bench into a lake, but then we don’t see any other mentions of his reaction to Natasha’s death after that, which seems odd considering the inclusion on screen of their relationship in the first place.


	5. Pepper Potts

Sometimes, trauma can come from trying to support other traumatized people when you don’t have the emotional resources to help them. This is certainly the case for Pepper Potts, who loves Tony and tries her best to help him, but is constantly worried about his safety and as a result becomes overwhelmed herself. From _Iron Man (2008)_ to _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ , Pepper is almost always there for Tony, supporting him, trying to help him take care of himself, and trying to encourage him to take actions to take care of and focus on himself rather than making self-sacrificing decisions. We see this in _Iron Man 2 (2010)_ , with the conversation between Pepper and Tony after Tony and Rhodey have defeated Ivan Vanko and his bots:

> Pepper: Oh my god! I can’t take this anymore.
> 
> Tony: You can’t? Look at me.
> 
> Pepper: I can’t take this. My body, literally, cannot handle the stress.
> 
> Pepper: I never know if you’re gonna kill yourself or wreck the whole company.
> 
> ( _Iron Man 2_ )

Eventually, as this quote alludes to, the stress and pressure becomes too much for her, and she leaves Tony for the time between _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ and _Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)_. She does return in _Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)_ , and we see her kissing Tony at the end of the movie, when Happy pulls out the engagement ring so they can announce something to the reporters that were supposed to be for Peter Parker being brought onto the Avengers as Spider-Man. In _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , we see Pepper and Tony together again, with Pepper tapping Tony’s new arc reactor and telling him that “If you wanted to have a kid, you wouldn’t have done that” ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ ). Pepper truly loves Tony, and that’s exactly why she wants him to let other people save the world instead, because she knows that he’ll do whatever he has to do to keep others safe, even if that means sacrificing himself, and she doesn’t want to lose him. However, in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , she also knows that the Avengers, and the world, need his help. When he figures out a way to time travel to retrieve the infinity stones, they have the following conversation: 

> Pepper Potts: We got really lucky.
> 
> Tony Stark: Yeah. I know.
> 
> Pepper Potts: A lot of people didn't.
> 
> Tony Stark: I can't help everybody.
> 
> Pepper Potts: It sort of seems like you can.
> 
> Tony Stark: Not if I stop. I can put a pin in it right now. And stop.
> 
> Pepper Potts: Tony - trying to get you to stop, has been one of the failures of my entire life.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

And at the end of the movie, when the only option was for Tony to use the infinity stones to beat Thanos and Tony is dying, Pepper talks to him as he’s dying, comforting him and reassuring him that “We’re gonna be okay. You can rest now” ( _Avengers: Endgame_ ). Pepper loves Tony enough to know that he needed to do this, and that as much as she’s going to miss him, he knew what he was doing, this was the only option, and now, with him so tired and in so much pain, she reassures him that they’ll be okay, and he’s allowed to rest now, to not have to fight to live through the pain and suffering.


	6. Bucky Barnes

In _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_ , we see Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers’ best friend, captured and tortured by HYDRA, then blown out of a train to fall to what was supposedly his death, only to be discovered in _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ as having been found by HYDRA, had a metal arm affixed to where his left arm had been severed, and then brainwashed into serving HYDRA on and off between cryo freezes for 70 years. He becomes a suspect in an international terrorist investigation in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , comes out of cryosleep in Wakanda to fight and die in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , then comes back to fight again in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ only to watch the one person that’s still alive that he’s known since childhood choose to go to live in the past without telling him, leaving him behind in a world he still doesn’t even know very well with no one he knows very well either. This is going to be one of the longer sections of this analysis, as there is a lot to be said about the MCU’s willingness to “movie magic” and “movie science” their way out of addressing the significant trauma Bucky experiences throughout the entire MCU.

Bucky’s trauma starts in _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_ , when his regiment, the 107th infantry, gets captured by HYDRA, and Bucky gets tortured, experimented on, and given an experimental super-soldier serum. The war in itself likely would have been traumatic enough for Bucky or his fellow soldiers to develop PTSD; in one article about PTSD in American World War Two veterans, it states: 

> Those of age in the late 1940s would have known differently. Though it was referred to by other names (shell shock, combat fatigue, neuropsychiatric disorders) the emotional toll of World War II was hard to miss in the immediate postwar years; [...] [t]he reality was that of the 16 million Americans who served in the armed forces during World War II, fewer than half saw combat. Of those who did, more than 1 million were discharged for combat-related neuroses, according to military statistics. [...] John Huston’s 1946 documentary, “Let There Be Light,” [...] said that “20% of all battle casualties in the American Army during World War II were of a neuropsychiatric nature.” [...] Through hard work and force of will, they created modern America. But in 1947, nearly half of the beds in every VA hospital in the nation were still occupied by soldiers with no visible wounds. While there were no reliable statistics on the topic, the epidemic of alcohol abuse was widely known. (Madigan)

With these statistics, it’s quite possible that Bucky would have already experienced some form of PTSD or other trauma-based disorder from the war in general, and when the torture and experimentation is factored in, it’s only that much more likely that Bucky would have developed PTSD. A meta-analysis of torture and PTSD “found an average prevalence of 31% of PTSD among survivors of torture and other evenly traumatic events in postwar context” (Schubert and Punamäki). While statistics indicate that it’s likely that Bucky would have experienced PTSD as a result of his experiences in World War II, there is no reference made to this possibility in _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_ , and there are no references to this later in Bucky’s life either, though that’s likely due to the brainwashing and memory wiping caused by HYDRA.

Bucky’s trauma continues in _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , where we see the aftermath of Bucky’s fall from the train, how he was given a metal left arm where his arm had been severed, was brainwashed and had his memories wiped by HYDRA, and was trained to be a weapon for HYDRA, being brought in and out of cryogenic sleep to perform missions. There’s a lot to discuss about Bucky’s time as the Winter Soldier, but two of the biggest aspects worth discussion is the trauma regarding Bucky’s arm and the effects and success (or lack thereof) of the memory wiping. The wiping of Bucky’s memories were not as successful as it should have been, as evidenced by the conversation between Bucky and Alexander Pierce after Bucky’s encounter with Steve on the bridge: 

> Alexander Pierce: Mission report.
> 
> [silence]
> 
> Alexander Pierce: Mission report now.
> 
> [Pierce backhands Bucky]
> 
> Bucky (as the Winter Soldier): The man on the bridge. Who was he?
> 
> Alexander Pierce: You met him earlier this week on another assignment.
> 
> Bucky: I knew him.
> 
> [...]
> 
> Alexander Pierce: But if you don’t do your part, I can’t do mine. And HYDRA can’t give the world the freedom it deserves.
> 
> Bucky: But I knew him.
> 
> ( _Captain America: Civil War_ )

In this scene, we see that while Bucky can’t recall all the details, he does still have some residual memories from before his various mind wipes. Because of this, it stands to reason that if Bucky’s memories are restored or the damage from the mind wipes is reversed, it’s likely that Bucky would recover any trauma from his past as well, including the negative repercussions of that trauma. However, even after Bucky shows signs of having regained some of his memories in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , we don’t seem to see any of the negative effects of trauma one would expect.

The other important aspect of Bucky’s time as the Winter Soldier is the metal arm. While we are obviously working with “movie science” here, there is something to be said for the sheer psychological and physical impact that having a prosthetic metal arm would have. In a theoretical analysis of the way Bucky’s metal arm works, the hypothetical conclusion reached is that the arm “has been very carefully grafted into the pectoral muscle” in Bucky’s chest and “there are wires and sensors that connect to Bucky’s spinal cord and nervous system” in Bucky’s back (Rux). This is important for a number of reasons, particularly because it has some strong indications towards Bucky experiencing pain as a result of the arm. In this theory, the arm itself doesn’t hurt, necessarily, but “it’s the _connections_ to the arm that cause Bucky pain, not the actual limb itself” (Rux). By pulling on the arm, it pulls on the wires connecting the arm to Bucky’s muscles, spinal cord, and nervous system, and that causes pain in those connected areas. The other conclusion drawn by this analysis of Bucky’s arm is that while Bucky doesn’t feel pain in the arm, he does feel pressure, and “enough pressure can be painful” (Rux). Therefore, it can be concluded that the arm could cause Bucky pain in some situations and would undoubtedly cause at least discomfort in various situations. After Tony used the suit to blow off Bucky’s arm, any discomfort would without a doubt have become pain as this theory speculated that “this comes from the sensors rapid-firing, straight into his nervous systems via those connections to his spinal column” (Rux). Despite the negative impact the arm likely has on Bucky’s physical and psychological health, we never see this referenced. In fact, after Shuri works to help remove the brainwashing programmed into him, it appears as if all trauma is simply dismissed entirely. While it certainly can be argued that Shuri is capable of such technology, it then calls into question why none of this technology is used for anyone else; why not simply remove everyone else’s past trauma from their memories? This apparent removal of all trauma from Bucky’s life feels more like a “deus ex machina” than a realistic or legitimate conclusion to draw.

Once Bucky has broken away from HYDRA and seems to have mostly recovered his memories in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , the rest of Bucky’s timeline in the MCU thus far speeds up significantly. Bucky is suspected of terrorism by multiple world governments, including T’Challa, who is looking for revenge believing that Bucky is the cause of his father T’Chaka’s death, and Steve helps him go on the run to find the person responsible and prove Bucky innocent, while avoiding the repercussions of the Sokovia Accords at the same time. After the fight with Tony in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , Steve takes Bucky to Wakanda, where he’s put into cryosleep again until _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , is taken due to the snap, and then returns in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ when the snap is reversed. This is where we get the last part of Bucky’s trauma in the MCU thus far, when Steve goes back in time to live out his life with Peggy and leaves Bucky behind. While this may have been a nice ending for Steve, this now leaves Bucky as a ‘man out of time,’ with no one he knows from the 30s still around except for a very old Steve, and when Steve passes away, this will leave Bucky having woken up in a world and century that he’s only vaguely familiar with and no one to help him through it, much like Steve was experiencing when he was first brought into the 21st century and, to his knowledge, all he had was Peggy, who was in a care facility. Again, due to how sped up Bucky’s timeline became, we don’t get to see any of how this trauma affected Bucky at this point.


	7. Peggy Carter

In _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_ and _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , we see Peggy Carter’s reaction to Steve’s death, and to seeing him again alive when she’s an old woman. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Peggy Carter doesn’t get a lot of screentime; however, in that time, we see how much she loves Steve, and we see how absolutely heartbroken she is when Steve crashes the Valkyrie in _Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)_. Peggy is shown sobbing at the radio after talking to Steve as he pilots the Valkyrie, and then she isn’t shown again until _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , when Steve visits her at her hospital bed, and she forgets who he is halfway through their conversation, and reacts as if she’s seeing him for the first time after the crash again: 

> Peggy Carter: Steve. You're alive. You came back.  
>    
>  Steve Rogers: Yeah, Peggy.  
>    
>  Peggy Carter: It's been so long. So long.  
>    
>  Steve Rogers: Well, I couldn't leave my best girl. Not when she owes me a dance.  
>    
>  ( _Captain America: The Winter Soldier_ )

Peggy isn’t shown very much on screen, but what is shown is realistic for someone who’s experienced grief and loss.


	8. Sam Wilson

In _Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)_ , we learn about Sam Wilson losing his friend Riley in Iraq. Steve comes to the VA and hears the last few minutes of a support group Sam runs, and then they have the following conversation: 

> Sam Wilson: Yeah, brother, we all got the same problems. Guilt, regret...  
>    
>  Steve Rogers: You lose someone?  
>    
>  Sam Wilson: My wingman, Riley. Fly in the night mission. A standard PJ rescue op, nothing we hadn't done a thousand times before, till an RPG knocks Riley's dumb ass out of the sky. Nothing I could do. It's like I was up there just to watch.  
>    
>  Steve Rogers: I'm sorry.  
>    
>  Sam Wilson: After that, I had a really hard time finding a reason for being over there, you know?
> 
> ( _Captain America: The Winter Soldier_ )

In this quote, and with Sam in general, we see one of the first characters in the MCU who has actually been processing their trauma in a healthy way; going to therapy, talking to other people, helping other people and feeling productive in doing so, and finding a safe outlet for emotions. This is one of the better representations of trauma in the MCU, and one of the healthier outcomes as well.


	9. Hope Van Dyne, Hank Pym, and Janet Van Dyne

In _Ant-Man (2015)_ , we see both Hope van Dyne and Hank Pym’s reactions to Hank’s wife, Janet van Dyne’s, death, both before and after Hank tells Hope how Janet actually died. Hank mentions that Hope learned martial arts during a difficult time, to which Hope replies:

> Hope Van Dyne: Oh, by "difficult time," he means when my mother died.  
>    
>  Hank Pym: We lost her in a plane crash.  
>    
>  Hope Van Dyne: It's bad enough you won't tell me how she died, could you please stop telling me that lie? We're working here.
> 
> ( _Ant-Man_ )

This quote reveals that Hank has been lying to Hope about how Janet died, and that Hope knows he’s lying, but he still won’t tell her the truth. We don’t learn why until later in the movie, when Hank explains what really happened: 

> Hank Pym: Your mother convinced me to let her join me on my... missions. They called her the Wasp. She was born to it. And there's not a day that goes by that I don't regret having said yes. It was 1987. Separatists had hijacked a Soviet missile silo in Kursk and launched an ICBM at the United States. The only way to the internal mechanics was through solid titanium. I knew I had to shrink between the molecules to disarm the missile. But my regulator had sustained too much damage. Your mother, she didn't hesitate. She turned off her regulator and went subatomic to deactivate the bomb. And she was gone. Your mom died a hero. And I spent the next ten years trying to learn all I could about the quantum realm.  
>    
>  Hope Van Dyne: [crying] You were trying to bring her back.  
>    
>  Hank Pym: But all I learned was we know nothing.  
>    
>  Hope Van Dyne: It's not your fault. She made her choice. But why didn't you tell me that sooner?  
>    
>  Hank Pym: I was trying to protect you. I lost your mother. I didn't mean to lose you, too.
> 
> ( _Ant-Man_ )

In this quote, it’s revealed that Hank didn’t want to lose Hope, and he likely believed that the lie he told would be less painful for Hope to hear than the truth and that Hope might have tried to enter the quantum realm to get her mother back if Hank told her the truth. While it doesn’t make Hank lying okay, it does explain why he thought that was the better alternative. After this point, however, we no longer see any references to Janet or any mentions of this trauma from either Hank or Hope. Meanwhile, in _Ant-Man (2015)_ and _Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)_ , Janet Van Dyne is stuck in the quantum realm and misses ten years of Hope’s life, and yet there is little to no mention of this trauma whatsoever. However, as Janet is not a main character, this isn’t entirely surprising.


	10. Natasha Romanoff

In _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ , we find out more about Natasha’s childhood, and how she was sterilized as a child and is unable to have children, a fact that severely upsets her, but no other part of her childhood is described, when it was almost certainly also traumatic. In _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ , Natasha is talking to Bruce, and after he says he can’t have children, she tells him:

> In the Red Room where I was trained... where I was raised, they have a graduation ceremony. They sterilize you. It's efficient. One less thing to worry about. The one thing that might matter more than a mission. Makes everything easier. Even killing. You still think you're the only monster on the team?  
>  _  
> _ ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ )

This is the first and only reference in the MCU to Natasha’s childhood. This in itself is traumatic, but it also calls into question what else happened in Natasha’s childhood; if the people who raised her had her sterilized as a child, what other traumas would they have caused her? However, we don’t see any of this represented on screen, so it’s hard to say. Once again, the MCU fails to address any of the possible trauma here, let alone further address the one trauma they did mention. Natasha’s other trauma on screen is in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , when we see how heartbroken Natasha is that Clint isn’t there and that the team has fallen apart and given up hope, especially when she considers the team to be family. At the beginning of the film, five years after the snap, Clint isn’t with the rest of the team, and Natasha is talking to Rhodey about Clint’s whereabouts:

> Natasha Romanoff: Where have you been?  
>    
>  James Rhodes: Mexico. The Federales found a room full of bodies. Looks like a bunch of cartel guys - never even had a chance to get their guns out.  
>    
>  Natasha Romanoff: It's probably a rival gang.  
>    
>  James Rhodes: Except that it isn't. It's definitely Barton. What he's done here, what he's been doing, for the last few years - if you'd seen what he's left - I gotta tell you, there's a part of me that doesn't even want to find him.  
>    
>  Natasha Romanoff: Will you find where he goes next?  
>    
>  James Rhodes: Nat...  
>    
>  Natasha Romanoff: Please?
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

Natasha is desperate to have Clint back, even if he’s potentially turned to morally grey actions once again. A little later, we see why Clint, and the team, is so important to her: 

> Steve: You know, I keep telling everybody they should move on. Grow. Some do. But not us.
> 
> Natasha: If I move on, I’m letting them down.
> 
> Steve: Maybe it doesn’t need to be done.
> 
> Natasha: I used to have nothing. And now I’ve got this. This job. This family. And I was… I was better because of it. And even though they’re gone, I’m still trying to be better.
> 
> Steve: I think we both need to get a life.
> 
> Natasha: You first.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

This is another vague reference to the possible trauma and isolation Natasha experienced in childhood and in her life in general, but once again, it doesn’t get mentioned further, detracting away from Natasha’s history.


	11. Wanda Maximoff and Pietro Maximoff

In _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)_ , we see Wanda Maximoff and Pietro Maximoff using their powers to help Ultron, as they hold Tony Stark responsible for the deaths of their parents caused by weapons manufactured by Stark Industries. This is encapsulated by a quote from Wanda Maximoff, “Ultron can't see the difference between saving the world and destroying it. Where do you think he gets that?” ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ ). This is a decent representation of trauma, because while Tony may not have been directly responsible for the deaths of their parents, it isn’t unusual for people to try and find someone to blame, because it gives them something concrete that they can hold responsible, rather than just seeing their loved ones’ deaths as unavoidable. This then changes when Wanda and Pietro realize what Ultron’s actual goal is, and they decided to help the Avengers instead, with Wanda even telling Clint during the battle “This is all our fault” ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ ). Realizing what Ultron is doing and what they’ve helped him to do, Wanda turns the blame on herself and Pietro, feeling that if they hadn’t helped Ultron, this wouldn’t be happening. This is likely untrue, as Ultron would probably have found other ways to enact his plan, but the trauma of Wanda’s belief is no less painful for her.

The next trauma we see is Wanda losing Pietro, and while it’s depicted as incredibly painful in the moment, it doesn’t get referenced much after the fact. When Pietro dies, Wanda collapses, screaming, on the ground, a burst of energy exploding around her and destroying the nearby bots. Wanda then seeks out Ultron, and is crouched over where he’s collapsed during the following conversation: 

> Ultron: If you stay here, you'll die.  
>    
>  Wanda Maximoff: I just did. Do you know how it felt?  
>    
>  [Wanda tears out Ultron's metal heart]  
>    
>  Wanda Maximoff: It felt like that.  
>    
>  ( _Avengers: Age of Ultron_ )

Pietro’s death is clearly depicted as violently traumatizing for Wanda, yet after _Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015),_ this never gets mentioned again. While the initial representation of grief was fantastic, the results of this trauma later are brushed aside and ignored.

In _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ we see Wanda trying to deal with the consequences of her actions that caused the deaths of people in Lagos, Nigeria. Wanda is watching news reports about her, and people talking about how there should be stricter observation over her and other people like her. Steve turns off the TV, and the two of them talk:

> Wanda: It’s my fault.
> 
> Steve: That’s not true.
> 
> Wanda: Turn the TV back on. They’re being very specific.
> 
> ( _Captain America: Civil War_ )

This short quote shows the grief, guilt, and shame that Wanda is feeling, and this appears to be a fairly normal reaction to this kind of trauma, to feeling responsible for something like this. However, Wanda’s mind changes quickly in the movie, with her leaving the tower with Clint to join Steve in the fight against the Accords. She leaves Vision behind, after the following conversation:

> Vision: If you do this, they will never stop being afraid of you.  
>    
>  Wanda Maximoff: I can't control their fear. Only my own.
> 
> ( _Captain America: Civil War_ )

While this may be an empowering statement in itself, it seems strange for Wanda to so quickly change her opinion of herself in the situation when her emotions were shown to be so intense earlier in the film.

In _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ we see her trying to cope with having to kill Vision, and then seeing Thanos bring Vision back and kill him again anyway, making her actions and Vision’s sacrifice worth nothing, which extends to _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ where she reassures Clint that both Natasha and Vision know that they won and that their sacrifices meant something. This starts with a conversation between Vision and Wanda in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , when Thanos is about to take the stone from Vision: 

> Vision: They can’t stop him, Wanda, but we can. Look at me. You have the power to destroy the stone.
> 
> Wanda: Don’t.
> 
> Vision: You must do it. Wanda, please. We are out of time.
> 
> Wanda: I can’t.
> 
> Vision: Yes, you can. You can. If he gets the stone, half the universe dies. It’s not fair. It shouldn’t be you, but it is. It’s alright. You could never hurt me. I just feel you.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ )

While Wanda knows what has to be done, she still doesn’t want to lose the person she loves. She does eventually destroy the stone, killing Vision in the process, but Thanos simply uses the time stone to bring Vision back and take the mind stone from him. At this point, Wanda discovers that Vision’s sacrifice, and her struggle of destroying the stone in the first place, were all for nothing. This trauma comes back in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , when Wanda comes back after the snap is reversed, and she faces off against Thanos:

> Wanda: You took everything from me.  
>    
>  Thanos: I don't even know who you are.  
>    
>  Wanda: You will.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

Where Wanda was hurt and heartbroken before, she’s now angry, furious that Thanos is the reason that she lost Vision, that everything she had sacrificed was for nothing, and that she still can’t get Vision back. This trauma is mentioned once again near the end of the film, in a conversation between Wanda and Clint:

> Clint Barton: You know, I wish there is a way that I can let her know... that we won, we did it.  
>    
>  Wanda Maximoff: She knows... they both do.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

In this quote, Wanda has finally reached a point of acceptance after all of her grief, content at least in the fact that Vision’s death wasn’t fruitless, that his death still had meaning. This is one of the better representations of trauma on screen, as it goes more in-depth into the different stages of Wanda’s grief and doesn’t dismiss her trauma.


	12. Rhodey

In _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , James “Rhodey” Rhodes is shot out of the sky while in the War Machine armor, the damage to the armor cutting off all controls and causing Rhodey to crash into the ground, causing severe damage to his spine and resulting in leg paralysis. This trauma is almost entirely brushed aside in the MCU, with only a scene near the end of the movie showing Rhodey doing physical therapy with the leg braces Tony’s made for him. After Rhodey falls, Tony holds out a hand to him:

> Tony: Let’s go. I’ll give you a hand.
> 
> Rhodey: No. Don’t help me.
> 
> Rhodey: 138. 138 combat missions. That’s how many I’ve flown, Tony. Every one of them could’ve been my last, but I flew them. Because the fight needed to be fought. It’s the same with these Accords. I signed because it was the right thing to do. And yeah, this sucks. This is, uh, this is a bad beat. But it hasn’t changed my mind. I don’t think.
> 
> ( _Captain America: Civil War_ )

After this, Rhodey’s paralysis is no longer mentioned, besides a brief scene in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , in which Nebula, referring to her metal arm, says “I wasn’t always like this” and Rhodey replies “Me neither. But we work with what we’ve got, right?” ( _Avengers: Endgame_ ). This scene shows Rhodey seemingly having come to full acceptance of his disability. While Rhodey’s paralysis otherwise goes unmentioned, he does continue to use the leg braces. However, this also brings up another important point in the MCU, and one that ties into psychological trauma as well: the representation of disability. We see Rhodey’s paralysis quickly dismissed and “fixed” by the leg braces Tony gives him, and it bears a strong resemblance to the way Bucky’s trauma was so easily “fixed” by Shuri. It quite frankly does a disservice not just to people with psychological disabilities, but physical disabilities as well, to have these problems simply “fixed” using movie science. Having Rhodey use a wheelchair, even occasionally when the leg braces are malfunctioning or the leg braces are causing Rhodey fatigue or extra strain in some way, would have been a good way of representing the struggle of physically disabled people to try to be “normal” and “fixed” in the way abled people expect them to be. The importance of this can be noted in one article on the way people view wheelchairs as restrictive, stating “A wheelchair does pretty much the opposite for those of us who use them; they enable us and they are extremely liberating devices” (Trott). A simple scene with Rhodey transferring from using a wheelchair to using his leg braces could have helped to represent wheelchair users as well, and normalize the idea that there’s nothing wrong with using a wheelchair either.

In _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we also see Rhodey mourning Tony’s death. There isn’t a lot shown of Rhodey during or after Tony’s death, and once again, there isn’t much to work with. However, there is the scene as Tony is dying where Rhodey comes up, meets his eyes, and without saying anything nods and steps back, pulling Peter away when Peter starts to cry in front of Tony. This scene showed various responses to loss, and Rhodey’s response was one of silent acceptance and grief. He knew that Tony was going to die, that this was it, and he likely wanted to make Tony’s last moments as peaceful as possible. There was potentially some reference to Rhodey missing Tony in the trailers for _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , but as they never became part of the movie and don’t have enough context to be sure what Rhodey was discussing, it’s hard to connect this to Rhodey’s grief of losing Tony.


	13. Sharon Carter

In  _ Captain America: Civil War (2016) _ we learn about Peggy Carter’s death, and see her niece, Sharon Carter, give a eulogy at her funeral. Even then, however, Sharon Carter’s grief over losing Peggy is incredibly brief on screen, and more time is devoted to Steve’s reactions than to Sharon’s, with Sharon’s eulogy even seeming to relate more to Steve’s inner conflict at the time than to herself. Furthermore, she and Steve kiss not long after this scene in the movie, and it seems strange to have a woman grieving over her aunt’s death and a man grieving over the death of the lost love of his life kissing, and it certainly doesn’t seem to fit with either of their characters or emotions at the time.


	14. Stephen Strange

In _Doctor Strange (2016)_ , we see Stephen Strange experience a severe car crash, which leaves his hands damaged, scarred, and constantly trembling, and causes Strange to experience mental breakdowns as he realizes that he will never be able to perform surgery again. This first comes up when Stephen comes back to consciousness after the car crash:

> Dr. Stephen Strange: [looking at his injured hands] Wha... What did they do?
> 
> Christine Palmer: They... rushed you in a chopper. But it took a little while to find you. The golden hours for nerve damage went by while you were in the car.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: What... did they do?
> 
> Christine Palmer: Eleven stainless steel pins in the bones. Multiple torn ligaments... severe nerve damage in both hands. You were on the table for eleven hours.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: [sobs] Look at these fixators.
> 
> Christine Palmer: No one could have done better.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: I could have done better.
> 
> ( _Doctor Strange_ )

It’s clear that Stephen is already mourning the loss of his hands, as Christine explains the damage and Stephen takes in the damage with his own eyes. At this point, Stephen is still in denial. This moves into bargaining and depression as Stephen tries to go through various dangerous, expensive, and experimental procedures to help prevent his hands from shaking. He finally snaps at Christine in anger after another surgeon refuses to try and operate on him:

> Christine Palmer: Stephen, you always spent money as fast as you can make it, but now you're spending money you don't even have. Maybe it's time to consider stopping.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: No, now is exactly not the time to stop, because, you see, I'M NOT GETTING ANY BETTER!
> 
> Christine Palmer: But this isn't medicine anymore, this is mania. Some things just can't be fixed.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: A life without my work...
> 
> Christine Palmer: Is still a life. This isn't the end, there are other things that can give your life meaning.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: [bitter] Like what? Like you?
> 
> Christine Palmer: ...and this is the part where you apologise.
> 
> Dr. Stephen Strange: This is the part where you leave.

( _Doctor Strange_ )

Once again, it’s clear that Stephen is mourning the loss of his job, of his hands, and of his life’s work. However, as the movie progresses and Stephen begins to become more involved in the mystic arts, this trauma seems to get forgotten, and it never comes up again, despite the fact that Stephen’s hands are, in fact, still damaged, his hands still shake, and they likely hurt as well, occasionally at the very least.

In _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , Stephen views 14,000,605 alternate futures for the battle against Thanos, and only sees one where they win. This is briefly mentioned, and while Stephen has to be calmed down after viewing all the possible futures, there is no mention as to all the possibilities Stephen might have seen, or the emotional or psychological toll this may have taken on him. Similarly, despite him reminding Tony that there’s only solution where they win, knowing that it means Tony will have to sacrifice himself, he doesn’t seem overly affected by this, before, during, or after Tony’s death.


	15. T'Challa

In _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ and _Black Panther (2018)_ we see T’Challa trying to process and cope with his father T’Chaka’s death, then, in _Black Panther (2018)_ , also trying to process and cope with the mistakes and decisions of his father by killing Killmonger’s father and abandoning young Erik Killmonger in the US. In _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , T’Challa seeks revenge against Bucky Barnes, believing Bucky to have been the cause of his father’s death: 

> Natasha: T’Challa, Task Force will decide who brings in Barnes.
> 
> T’Challa: Don’t bother, Ms. Romanoff. I’ll kill him myself.
> 
> ( _Captain America: Civil War_ )

For most of the rest of the movie, T’Challa pursues Bucky, siding with Tony and the heroes who agreed to the Accords in an attempt to get to Bucky and kill him. However, he realizes at the end of the movie that it’s Zemo, not Bucky, who is responsible for T’Chaka’s death, and he confronts Zemo. Zemo explains how his family died during the battle against Ultron, and how he wanted the Avengers to pay, and T’Challa tells him “Vengeance has consumed you. It’s consuming them. I am done letting it consume me. Justice will come soon enough” ( _Captain America: Civil War_ ).  This is a more realistic change of heart in the MCU, as T’Challa is clearly shown to have justification for his change of beliefs. He sees what is happening to those around him as a result of their vengeance, and he chooses not to continue to do the same. We also see a continuation of his mourning for his father in _Black Panther (2018)_ , when he travels to the ancestral plane to receive the powers of the Black Panther and talks to his father:

> T'Challa: I am not ready, Baba.  
>    
>  King T'Chaka: Have you not prepared to be king your whole life? Have you not trained and studied, been by my side?  
>    
>  T'Challa: That is not what I am talking about. I am not ready to be without you.  
>    
>  King T'Chaka: A man who has not prepared his children for his own death has failed as a father. Have I ever failed you?  
>    
>  T’Challa: Never.
> 
> ( _Black Panther_ )

By seeing his father in the ancestral plane and talking to him, T’Challa gets closure, and is able to more fully process his father’s death and move on. Also in _Black Panther (2018)_ , we see T’Challa coping with finding out about his father killing his uncle, Erik Killmonger’s father, and how this lie seems to cause him to hold back in the challenge fight between him and Killmonger. When he visits the ancestral plane again, he yells at his father and the ancestors, telling them:

> You were wrong - all of you were wrong - to turn your backs on the rest of the world! We let the fear of discovery stop us from doing what is right. No more! I cannot stay here with you. I cannot rest while HE sits on the throne! He is a monster of our own making! I must take the mantle back. I must! I must right these wrongs!
> 
> ( _Black Panther_ )

Once again, T’Challa’s emotions and convictions change due to substantial evidence; faced with the mistakes of past kings, including his father, T’Challa chooses to be different, to take what he’s learned and make changes to solve the problems that have been created.


	16. Erik Killmonger

In a contrasting yet parallel storyline, _Black Panther (2018)_ gives us Erik Killmonger, or N’Jadaka, a man whose father was murdered by T’Chaka when Erik was still a child. In a parallel to T’Challa’s desire for revenge in _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , Killmonger wants revenge on T’Chaka and T’Challa for what happened to his father, and he’s spent years trying to get the opportunity to kill them. This is evident in the reveal of who Killmonger is to the tribe leaders, as well as in his statement before the challenge fight:

> Killmonger: I found my daddy with Panther claws in his chest! You ain’t the son of a king. You a son of a murderer.
> 
> [...]
> 
> Killmonger: I lived my entire life waitin’ for this moment. I trained, I lied, I killed, just to get here. I killed in America, Afghanistan, Iraq. I took life from my own brothers and sisters right here on this continent. And all this death, just so I could kill you.
> 
> ( _Black Panther_ )

While T’Challa recognized that his vengeance wasn’t constructive, Killmonger doesn’t, and is more focused on doing what he believes he must do to right Wakanda’s wrongs of closing themselves off from the rest of the world. This ultimately leads to Killmonger’s death, as he decides that he would prefer death over imprisonment. This is a very good example of trauma and loss, and how revenge, and hatred, can lead people down the road to their own demise.


	17. W'Kabi

In _Black Panther (2018)_ , W’Kabi’s grief over his parents’ deaths because of Ulysses Klaue causes him to seek revenge in his anger, blinded to any other solution than Klaue’s death, with W’Kabi choosing to support Killmonger’s plan to overthrow white oppressors using weapons from Wakanda, largely in part due to his gratitude that Killmonger killed Klaue. This is first evident near the beginning of the movie, with him telling T’Challa “Now, if you said you wanted me and my men to go out there and clean up the world, then I’ll be all for it” ( _Black Panther_ ). W’Kabi is more inclined to use violence to solve problems, rather than consider alternatives, such as outreach programs. Similar to Killmonger, this is a good example of how W’Kabi’s trauma has led him to view violence and revenge as the solution.


	18. Shuri and Ramonda

In _Black Panther (2018)_ , Shuri and Ramonda are coping with both T’Chaka and T’Challa’s deaths, and much of their grief isn’t shown on screen. After T’Chaka’s death from _Captain America: Civil War (2016)_ , Ramonda is shown as sad and grieving, but also accepting of what has happened, telling T’Challa when he asks how she’s feeling “Proud. Your father and I would talk about this day all the time. He is with us, and it is your time to be king” ( _Black Panther_ ). Meanwhile, Shuri doesn’t discuss T’Chaka’s death almost at all, seemingly unaffected until after T’Challa falls from the waterfall, when she tells Ramonda as Nakia is getting them to safety “First Baba. And now my brother. Mama, we didn’t even get to bury him” ( _Black Panther_ ). In this scene, both Ramonda and Shuri are grieving what they believe to be T’Challa’s death, both of them going through various stages of sadness, anger, and denial. While Shuri wasn’t shown to be grieving T’Chaka near the beginning of the movie, and was instead sarcastic and joking, it’s also possible that this was Shuri using humor and distraction to cope, which isn’t unusual after losing someone. Overall, while Shuri and Ramonda aren’t focused on a lot, their reactions to trauma do seem entirely reasonable.


	19. Nakia and Okoye

In _Black Panther (2018)_ , Nakia and Okoye are shown grieving over T’Challa’s death, and in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ and _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , Okoye is shown as having survived the snap, though her grieving T’Challa isn’t shown much. For Nakia, it’s unclear whether or not she survived Thanos’ snap, and therefore unclear whether she also grieved over T’Challa being taken in the snap. After T’Challa’s death in _Black Panther (2018)_ , Nakia gets Ramonda and Shuri safely away from Killmonger, and she and Okoye have a conversation before she leaves:

> Okoye: The Queen Mother and Shuri, they are safe?
> 
> Nakia: Yes.
> 
> Okoye: Thank you.
> 
> Nakia: We should get to them immediately.
> 
> Okoye: I cannot.
> 
> Nakia: What?
> 
> Okoye: Though my heart is with you.
> 
> Nakia: We cannot turn over our nation to a man who showed up here only hours ago.
> 
> Okoye: He is of royal blood.
> 
> Nakia: He killed T’Challa!
> 
> Okoye: In ritual combat.
> 
> Nakia: Does that really matter?
> 
> ( _Black Panther_ )

In this scene, both Nakia and Okoye are grieving, but they also have two very different perspectives on what must be done; Okoye believes that she is obligated to serve Killmonger as the new king, while Nakia believes that she must get Killmonger off the throne. However, Okoye is still grieving T’Challa’s death, and this evident in the words “though my heart is with you.” Both women’s grief is well represented in this scene. In _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , T’Challa is believed dead once again, this time with him dying right in front of Okoye. Grief is clear on Okoye’s face in the scene, but after that, her grief over losing T’Challa is no longer mentioned, and even in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , it doesn’t come up. As for Nakia, it’s unclear whether or not Nakia even survived Thanos’ snap in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , and so any grief she may or may not have had over T’Challa’s death cannot be determined.


	20. Ava Starr

In _Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)_ , Ava Starr, or Ghost, experiences symptoms as a result of the blast that killed her parents, leaving her body phasing in and out of existence uncontrollably and causing her intense physical pain and suffering on top of her grief, also knowing that she will eventually die as a result of her condition. When she talks to Scott and he sees her phasing without the suit, he asks if she needs the suit to phase, and she tells him “No. It just helps me control it. And the pain, supposedly” ( _Ant-Man and the Wasp_ ). Once Hank and Hope are both awake as well, Ava explains what happened that caused her current condition:

> Ava: When I woke up, my parents were dead. I wasn’t so lucky. They call it “molecular disequilibrium.” A rather dull name, I think. Doesn’t quite do justice to what it means. Every cell in my body is torn apart… and stitched back together again. Over and over. Every day.
> 
> [...]
> 
> Ava: Dr. Foster did his best to keep me safe. But others at S.H.I.E.L.D. saw an opportunity in my affliction. They built me a containment suit, so I could control my phasing. And trained me to be a stealth operative. They weaponized me. I stole for them. Spied for them. Killed for them. And in exchange for my soul, they were going to cure me. They lied.
> 
> ( _Ant-Man and the Wasp_ )

Ava is grieving, not just for the loss of her parents, but also for the loss of a chance to have a normal life, the loss of the years she spent helping S.H.I.E.L.D. and didn’t get any help in return. She’s angry, and in denial, and she’s willing to do whatever it takes, no matter the cost, to get some semblance of a normal life again. This is a great example of trauma, including at the end of the film, when Janet van Dyne has been brought back from the quantum realm and they see Ava stumbling to her feet:

> Janet: Your pain. I can feel it.
> 
> Ava: It hurts. It always hurts.
> 
> Janet: I’m sorry. I think I can help you.
> 
> ( _Ant-Man and the Wasp_ )

Janet helps stop Ava from phasing, and Ava starts to cry. Ava, finally faced with someone who believes that she’s in pain and believes that she deserves better, moves from anger to sadness and relief, glad that someone’s finally going to help. This is a wonderful representation of how important it is to believe people who they say they are in pain, and how helpful it can be to the person in pain to be given the help and support they need.


	21. Carol Danvers

In _Captain Marvel (2019)_ , Carol Danvers is trying to process and cope with multiple traumas all at once; discovering and recovering from her memory loss, fighting a war she’s been told she has to fight in, dealing with a lack of a sense of identity, learning to control her powers, and trying to figure out who her true enemy is in the war she’s supposed to fight in. Carol struggles with her memory loss, saying “I keep having these... memories. I see flashes. I think I have a life here. But I can't tell if it's real” ( _Captain Marvel_ ). Carol’s clearly distressed about this, as evidenced by her panic when the Skrulls are looking at her memories on their ship, and when she’s on Earth, with Nick Fury’s help, she finds out that she does, in fact, have a life on Earth, and she goes to visit Maria Rambeau, an old friend and fellow pilot. This is also where she discovers that the Skrulls aren’t as terrible as she had originally thought, talking to Talos, a Skrull who reveals the truth to her, that the Kree have been hunting and killing the Skrulls without mercy. This, along with Carol’s memory loss, causes her to panic, telling Maria that she doesn’t even know who she is, to which Maria tells her:

> You are Carol Danvers. You were the woman on that black box risking her life to do the right thing. My best friend. Who supported me as a mother and a pilot when no one else did. You were smart, and funny, and a huge pain in the ass. And you were the most powerful person I knew, way before you could shoot fire through your fists.
> 
> ( _Captain Marvel_ )

This is a turning point for Carol, in which she decides to help the Skrulls survive and escape the Kree, and this leads to a battle between Carol and Yon-Rogg, her former Kree mentor. Yon-Rogg challenges Carol to battle him without her powers, and Carol tells him “I have nothing to prove to you” ( _Captain Marvel_ ). This is an important moment, because it shows that Carol no longer feels the doubt, frustration, and fear that have consumed her for most of the movie, and instead has confidence in herself, who she is, and what she’s capable of. _Captain Marvel (2019)_ was a good representation of trauma, in the fact that Carol had so much trauma occurring at once that it left her confused, uncertain, and fairly easily manipulated for much of the movie, until she finally started to get the clarity she needed to believe in herself again.


	22. Drax

In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ and _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , we see Drax trying to avenge the deaths of his wife and daughter at the hands of Ronan and, by extension, Thanos. In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , he tries to kill Ronan, going as far as summoning him to a planet to battle, only to almost die, cause Quill and Gamora to be captured by Yondu and the Ravagers, and have the power stone taken by Ronan. This leads to a conversation between him and Rocket, in which Drax says “I was a fool. All that anger. All that rage. It just covered my loss” ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ ). Drax is clearly aware that his anger did nothing to help him after the deaths of his wife and daughter, and he seems truly regretful in this scene. But at the end of the movie, when Ronan has been killed and the Guardians have saved Xandar, he is talking to Gamora, and she tells him:

> Gamora: Your wife and child shall rest well, knowing that you have avenged them.  
>    
> Drax the Destroyer: Yes. Of course Ronan was only a puppet. It's really Thanos that I need to kill.
> 
> ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ )

At this point, it becomes more clear that while Drax does not intend to act as irrationally as he had previously, he still fully intends to avenge his family’s deaths by killing Thanos. This is shown in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , when the Guardians go to get the Reality Stone from Knowhere, and Drax attempts to attack Thanos, and again when Drax and the others attack him on Titan. Drax is willing to do whatever he must to avenge his family’s deaths, but he does, at the very least, start to act a little more rationally about it in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ than he had in _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_.


	23. Peter Quill

In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)_ , _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , and _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we see Peter Quill lose his mother Meredith Quill, his biological father Ego, his father figure Yondu, and his lover Gamora, each loss more painful than the last as he tries to process each of their deaths. Peter loses his mom at the beginning of _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , when the movie opens with Meredith dying in the hospital. Meredith gives Peter a present, and tells him:

> Meredith: You open it up when I’m gone, okay? Your grandpa is gonna take such good care of you. At least until your daddy comes back to get you. Take my hand. Peter.
> 
> Grandpa: Pete, come on.
> 
> Meredith: Take my hand.
> 
> [Meredith’s vitals flatline]
> 
> Peter Quill: Mom? No! No! No! No! Mom! No!
> 
> ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ )

This trauma comes up repeatedly throughout _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , with Rocket finding the still wrapped gift Meredith had given Peter and Peter getting defensive about it, and Peter at the end opening the gift to reveal an “Awesome Mix Vol. 2.” This trauma is also well represented in _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)_ , where Peter is snapped out of the vision Ego is showing him when Ego reveals that he was the one to put the tumor in Meredith’s head. Peter is shown mourning his mom’s death, and this is a great representation of grief and loss.

In _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)_ , Peter loses Yondu, and before they give Yondu the Ravager send off, Peter is talking about how he had pretended David Hasselhoff was his dad as a kid because his father wasn’t around, and he compares Yondu to Hasselhoff, saying: 

> I guess David Hasselhoff did kind of end up being my dad after all. Only it was you, Yondu. I had a pretty cool dad. What I’m trying to say here is… sometimes that thing you’re searching for your whole life… it’s right there by your side all along. You don’t even know it.
> 
> ( _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2_ )

In this scene, Peter’s grief is clearly shown, as well as his love for Yondu, realizing that he had always been looking for a family, but already had one with Yondu all along. The final grief of Peter Quill’s that’s shown is his loss of Gamora after Thanos sacrifices her for the soul stone. He discovers this when they’re trying to get the gauntlet away from Thanos on Titan:

> Mantis: He… He mourns.
> 
> Drax: What does this monster have to mourn?
> 
> Nebula: Gamora.
> 
> Quill: What?
> 
> Nebula: He took her to Vormir. He came back with the Soul Stone. But she didn’t.
> 
> Tony: Okay, Quill, you gotta cool it right now. You understand? Don’t, don’t. Don’t engage. We almost got this off!
> 
> Quill: Tell me she’s lying. Asshole, tell me you didn’t do it!
> 
> Thanos: I had to.
> 
> Quill: No, you didn’t. No, you didn’t. No, you didn’t!
> 
> ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ )

Quill proceeds to attack Thanos, and this causes Mantis to lose her grip and Thanos to regain his strength, taking the gauntlet back. In Quill’s anger and grief, he causes their plan to fall apart, and gives Thanos the chance to regain the upper hand. Quill’s grief over the years and over his various loved ones is generally very well represented in the MCU, and it’s one of the times when the MCU really succeeded in showing trauma.


	24. Gamora

In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , and _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we see Gamora trying to process her trauma of being abused, trained, and tortured by Thanos. This first becomes obvious in _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , when Quill, Groot, Rocket, and Gamora are being brought into the Kyln and Gamora tells them “Whatever nightmares the future holds are but dreams compared to what's behind me” ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ ). After Quill stops Drax from killing her, she reveals how much the Collector was willing to pay her for the stone, saying “That Orb is my opportunity to get away from Thanos and Ronan” ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ ). Both quotes reveal Gamora’s desire to get away from Thanos and how glad she is that she’s away from him in any possible way. This is expanded on in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , when Gamora has been taken by Thanos again, and she is talking to Thanos on his ship: 

> Gamora: I always hated that chair.
> 
> Thanos: So I’ve been told. Even so, I’d hoped you’d sit in it one day.
> 
> Gamora: I hated this room. This ship. I hated my life.
> 
> Thanos: You told me that too. Every day. For almost 20 years.
> 
> Gamora: I was a child when you took me.
> 
> Thanos: I saved you.
> 
> Gamora: No. No. We were happy on my home planet.
> 
> [...]
> 
> Thanos: Little one, it’s a simple calculus. This universe is finite, its resources finite. If life is left unchecked, life will cease to exist. It needs correction.
> 
> Gamora: You don’t know that!
> 
> Thanos: I’m the only one who knows that. At least, I’m the only one with the will to act on it. For a time, you had that same will… as you fought by my side. Daughter.
> 
> Gamora: I’m not your daughter. Everything I hate about myself you taught me.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ )

In this quote, it becomes undeniably obvious how much Thanos has traumatized Gamora; he murdered half of her planet, took her with him, and shaped her the way he wanted her to be, caused her to hate so much of who she is. She has never considered him a father, and has always resented Thanos for what he’s done. Up to this point, Gamora’s trauma has been well portrayed, but this changes when Gamora and Thanos go to Vormir, and they discover how the soul stone must be acquired:

> Red Skull: In order to take the stone, you must lose that which you love. A soul.. for a soul.
> 
> [Gamora laughing]
> 
> Gamora: All my life, I dreamed of a day, a moment, when you got what you deserved. And I was always so disappointed. But now… you kill and torture… and you call it mercy. The universe has judged you. You asked it for a prize, and it told you no. You failed. And do you wanna know why? Because you love nothing. No one.
> 
> Thanos: No.
> 
> Gamora: Really? Tears?
> 
> Red Skull: They’re not for him.
> 
> Gamora: No. This isn’t love.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ )

This is a very conflicting scene, as it shows the way that abusers often don’t consider themselves to be abusers, and that they often love or claim to love their victims, while the person being abused doesn’t feel loved, doesn’t consider what happened to them to be love. This is often how abuse victims are dismissed by their abusers and the people around them; if the abuser appears to love their victim, people are more willing to forgive the abuser. In this scene, Thanos is portrayed in such a way that it tries to evoke sympathy in the viewer, and it seems to view Thanos as a victim for having to sacrifice Gamora, pushing aside Gamora’s years of pain and abuse to try and humanize Thanos, something that feels very disingenuous to Gamora’s experience.


	25. Nebula

In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)_ , _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , and _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , Nebula is shown to have been abused, tortured, and experimented on by Thanos in the time after he took her from her home planet, where he killed her parents and half of the planet’s population, and it becomes apparent that Nebula desperately wanted to please Thanos and became trauma bonded to him. In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , when Ronan reveals his intention to kill Thanos, he asks Nebula if she’ll oppose him, and Nebula replies “You see what he has turned me into? You kill him and I will help you destroy a thousand planets” ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ ). This is the first time Nebula is shown as anything but loyal to Thanos, and this is likely because in this scene, Ronan has just managed to harness the energy of the power stone, and in this moment Nebula probably sees Ronan as potentially strong enough to actually kill Thanos. Nebula and her trauma isn’t really shown again until _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)_ , when she crashes a ship onto Ego’s planet and attacks Gamora, almost killing Gamora before she lets go, saying:

> Nebula: I win. I win. I bested you in combat.
> 
> Gamora: No. I saved your life.
> 
> Nebula: Well, you were stupid enough to let me live.
> 
> Gamora: You let me live!
> 
> Nebula: I don’t need you always trying to beat me!
> 
> Gamora: I’m not the one that just flew across the universe just because I wanted to win.
> 
> Nebula: Do not tell me what I want.
> 
> Gamora: I don’t need to tell you what you want! It’s obvious!
> 
> Nebula: You were the one who wanted to win. And I just wanted a sister! You were all I had. But you were the one who needed to win. Thanos pulled my eye from my head… and my brain from my skull… and my arm from my body… because of you.
> 
> ( _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2_ )

This quote shows not just Nebula’s trauma from Thanos, but also how she blamed some of that trauma on Gamora, considering Gamora responsible for Thanos making modifications to her body after their fights. This is something else that’s important to talk about, because this can also be one of the ways that abusers detract away from themselves as the abuser; by pitting their victims against each other, they can simultaneously abuse their victims and claim innocence in the matter. This also builds up how much Nebula tried to please Thanos, something that continues to come up in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , with Nebula telling the Avengers team at the beginning of the movie “Thanos spent a long time trying to perfect me. Then when he worked, he talked about his great plan. Even disassembled, I wanted to please him” ( _Avengers: Endgame_ ). This is also common in abuse survivors; abuse victims often believe that if they can just manage to be “good enough” for their abusers, that the abuse will stop. Another common occurrence in abuse victims is believing that there is no possible escape from their abuse, something that is shown later in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , in a confrontation between 2014 Nebula, Gamora, and present-day Nebula, when 2014 Nebula is taking the gauntlet with the infinity stones to 2014 Thanos:

> Gamora: Stop.  
>    
>  2014 Nebula: You're betraying us?  
>    
>  Gamora: You don't have to do this.  
>    
>  2014 Nebula: I am... this.  
>    
>  Nebula: No, you're not. You've seen what we become.  
>    
>  Gamora: Nebula, listen to her.  
>    
>  Nebula: You can change.  
>    
>  2014 Nebula: He won't let me.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

Despite even future Nebula telling her that she can change, that she can get away from Thanos, 2014 Nebula, still currently being abused by Thanos, can’t believe it, doesn’t see how she can possible live a life away from Thanos. Nebula’s story, painful and horrific as it is, is also one of the greater representations of trauma in the MCU.


	26. Rocket

In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)_ , _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , and _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we see Rocket trying to deal with the trauma of having been created as the result of experiments, his low self worth as a result of other people’s comments towards him, and his grief after the only family he’s ever known, Groot and the rest of the Guardians, die. In _Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)_ , when Rocket and Drax get drunk on Knowhere, they get into a fight, which leads to Rocket yelling at Peter Quill:

> Rocket Raccoon: Well, I didn't ask to get made! I didn't ask to be torn apart and put back together over and over and turned into some little monster!  
>    
>  Peter Quill: Rocket, no one's calling you a monster...  
>    
>  Rocket Raccoon: He called me vermin! She called me rodent! Let's see if you can laugh after five or six good shots in your freakin' face!  
>    
>  ( _Guardians of the Galaxy_ )

It’s clear how much Rocket hates having been created, having been experimented on and turned into who he is now, and this continues to be used as a running gag in future movies, effectively mocking Rocket’s pain and trauma related to this, despite how much of a negative impact this is clearly shown to have on Rocket’s self worth. The next trauma of Rocket’s that is revealed is a combination of his trauma around his own creation and his place on the Guardians team, and this is revealed in a heated discussion between Rocket and Yondu on the Ravager ship:

> Yondu: You can fool yourself and everyone else, but you can’t fool me. I know who you are.
> 
> Rocket: You don’t know anything about me, loser.
> 
> Yondu: I know everything about you. I know you play like you’re the meanest and the hardest but, actually, you’re the most scared of all.
> 
> Rocket: Shut up!
> 
> Yondu: I know you steal batteries you don’t need and you push away anyone who’s willing to put up with you, because just a little bit of love reminds you how big and empty that hole inside you actually is.
> 
> Rocket: I said shut up!
> 
> Yondu: I know them scientists what made you never gave a rat’s ass about you.
> 
> Rocket: I’m serious, dude!
> 
> Yondu: Just like my own damn parents who sold me, their own little baby, into slavery. I know who you are, boy. Because you’re me.
> 
> ( _Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2_ )

This scene not only reveals how much trauma Rocket is repressing, but also how much trauma Yondu has, with Yondu comparing the two of them. This scene references back to Rocket’s trauma about being experimented on, and also reveals a lot of the reasoning behind his actions up to this point. A common reaction to trauma is to isolate yourself from others, and this is what we see with Rocket; he pushes people away, believing that it will hurt less if he doesn’t get close to people in the first place. This makes it only that much harder for Rocket after _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , when everyone from the Guardians team beside him and Nebula is gone, and the impact this has on Rocket is shown in a scene between him and Thor on 2013 Asgard, when Thor is panicking about how his mom is about to die in this timeline, and Rocket tells him:

> I lost the only family I ever had. Quill, Groot, Drax, the chick with the antenna, all gone. I know you miss your mom, but she's gone. Really gone. And there’s a lot of people who are only kind of gone and you can help them.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

This is where it becomes entirely clear just how much the team meant to Rocket, and how he considered them family, that he really was just trying to do what he thought he had to do to protect himself from being hurt.


	27. Valkyrie

In _Thor: Ragnarok (2017)_ , we see Valkyrie mourn the loss of her fellow Valkyries, including the woman who was implied to be her romantic partner. Valkyrie chose to stay on Sakaar after falling out of the bifrost during the battle with Hela, drinking heavily to try and forget the trauma of losing her fellow Valkyries. It’s not until Thor tries to get her help and Loki forces her to remember the battle against Hela that she finally agrees to help, telling Thor:

> I don't plan to stop drinking. But... I don't wanna forget. I can't turn away anymore. So, if I'm gonna die, well, it might as well be driving my sword through the heart of that murderous hag.
> 
> ( _Thor: Ragnarok_ )

Valkyrie’s alcoholism is not an uncommon reaction to trauma; many people turn to substances in an attempt to forget the pain of their pasts, and this is what happens with Valkyrie. However Valkyrie realizes, as many people do, that while drinking or illicit drugs of one type or another can help dull or numb the pain, they don’t solve the trauma itself. Valkyrie later steps up to the plate in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ to help the people of New Asgard when Thor is no longer taking command as their leader.


	28. Hela

In _Thor: Ragnarok (2017)_ , it’s shown how Odin abused his daughter, Hela; specifically, how he raised her and trained her to be the Goddess of Death, then, when he decided he no longer wanted to continue conquering places and killing others, he locked her away rather than trying to help her change, and punished her for being the way he himself had made her. Hela is first described by Odin, who, while explaining about Ragnarok, says:

> Odin: It has already begun. She’s coming. My life was all that held her back. But my time has come. I cannot keep her away any longer.
> 
> Thor: Father, who are you talking about?
> 
> Odin: Goddess of Death. Hela. My firstborn. Your sister.
> 
> Thor: Your what?
> 
> Odin: Her violent appetites grew beyond my control. I couldn’t stop her, so I imprisoned her. Locked her away. She draws her strength from Asgard… and once she gets there, her powers will be limitless.
> 
> ( _Thor: Ragnarok_ )

This paints a terrifying picture of Hela, describing her in a way that makes the viewer inclined to think of her as an aggressive villain who willingly chose violence. However, a later scene with Hela in the royal palace on Asgard reveals a very different story, when Hela looks at the paintings on the palace ceiling, saying:

> Does no one remember me? Has no one been taught our history? Look at these lies. Goblets and garden parties? Peace treaties? Odin… proud to have it… ashamed of how he got it. We were unstoppable. I was his weapon in the conquest that built Asgard’s empire. One by one, the realms became ours. But then, simply because my ambition outgrew his, he banished me, caged me, locked me away like an animal. Before that, Asgard’s warriors were honored… their bodies buried as heroes beneath this very palace.
> 
> ( _Thor: Ragnarok_ )

When Hela reveals the paintings of her and Odin’s conquests from beneath the paintings of Odin, Thor, Frigga, and Loki, she reveals the truth Odin had chosen to omit; that Hela was not violent of her own making, but of Odin’s, even being self-described as Odin’s “weapon,” not his daughter. This is very reminiscent of Nebula’s relationship with Thanos, of how Thanos treated Nebula more as a weapon and a tool for him to use rather than a daughter, a living individual of her own right. Hela, locked away for thousands of years, comes back and continues to do the one thing she knows best; she kills people with the goal of conquering other places again. Because Hela never knew a life without death, thanks to the way she was treated in her time fighting alongside Odin, it’s fairly unreasonable to expect her to understand how to do anything else with the same ease or capacity as anyone else might be able to.


	29. Loki

In _Thor (2011)_ , we are first introduced to Loki, God of Mischief and brother of Thor Odinson. Throughout _Thor (2011)_ and _Thor: The Dark World (2013)_ , Loki is presented as a villain, possessed by the desire for power and attention, but when more attention is paid to the motivations behind Loki’s actions, this no longer appears to be the case, but rather it appears that Loki has been abused by Odin and believes that he must take matters into his own hands for the sake of others. While trauma does not justify his actions, they do explain his motivations, providing more depth to his character than is obvious in the way his character is presented in the MCU. In _Thor (2011)_ , when Loki discovers that he isn’t fully Asgardian and confronts Odin about it, Odin reveals that he took Loki from Jotunheim after the battle against Laufey and the Frost Giants:

> Odin: I thought we could unite our kingdoms one day. Bring about an alliance, bring about permanent peace... through you.  
>    
>  Loki: What?  
>    
>  Odin: But those plans no longer matter.  
>    
>  Loki: So I am no more than another stolen relic, locked up here until you might have use of me?  
>    
>  Odin: Why do you twist my words?  
>    
>  Loki: You could have told me what I was from the beginning! Why didn't you?  
>    
>  Odin: You’re my son... I wanted only to protect you from the truth...  
>    
>  Loki: What, because I... I... I am the monster parents tell their children about at night?  
>    
>  Odin: No! No!  
>    
>  Loki: You know, it all makes sense now, why you favored Thor all these years, because no matter how much you claim to love me, you could never have a Frost Giant sitting on the throne of Asgard!
> 
> ( _Thor_ )

This scene would be reminiscent of how Hank lied to Hope about how Janet died if it wasn’t for the underlying self-hatred that Odin also caused in Loki for so long; from the beginning of the movie, Odin tells stories to a young Thor and young Loki about the Frost Giants as some great evil that he had defeated long ago, to the point where a young Thor refers to them as “monsters,” a name which Odin does not dispute. While Odin denies Loki’s statements in this scene, the stories that he’s told to Thor and Loki as children contradict this, and by hiding this truth from Loki, this now leaves Loki in a place of confusion, self-doubt, and self-hatred, learning that he is one of the very beings he learned from a young age were evil. As he grapples with what to do with this information, he ultimately determines to fight against the Frost Giants, even killing his biological father, Laufey, in an effort to prove himself to Odin, as evidenced in his argument with Thor later:

> Thor: Why have you done this?  
>    
>  Loki: To prove to Father that I am a worthy son! When he wakes, I will have saved his life, I will have destroyed that race of monsters, and I will be true heir to the throne!  
>    
>  Thor: You can't kill an entire race!  
>    
>  Loki: Why not?... And what is this new found love for the Frost Giants? You, could have killed them all with your bare hands!  
>    
>  Thor: I've changed.  
>   
>  Loki: So have I. Now fight me!
> 
> ( _Thor_ )

This is also a fairly common reaction in abuse victims/survivors, as was previously mentioned in regards to Nebula: to try and prove themselves worthy to their abuser, in the hopes that it will stop the abuse from happening, and that it will give the abuse victim the loving, non-abusive relationship they had wanted with their abuser. This is evidenced in a later dialogue between Loki and Odin at the end of the movie:

> Loki: [hanging from the edge of the Bifrost] I could have done it, Father! I could have done it! For you! For all of us!  
>    
>  Odin: No, Loki.
> 
> ( _Thor_ )

At this point, Loki lets go of the edge of the Bifrost, choosing to disappear elsewhere into space rather than try fruitlessly to get the relationship he wanted from Odin. Loki’s trauma about his Frost Giant identity makes a reappearance in _Thor: Ragnarok (2017)_ as well, when Loki appears as a mirage to Thor in the contestant’s area on Sakaar as Thor is mourning Odin’s death, with Loki telling Thor “Hurts, doesn’t it? Being lied to. Being told you’re one thing and then learning it’s all a fiction” ( _Thor: Ragnarok_ ). This also makes sense for trauma survivors, to still dwell on and try to cope with traumas years after they first occurred.

Loki’s abuse from Odin comes into play again in _Thor: The Dark World (2013)_ , in which, despite what he had previously said about Loki being his son, Odin tells him “Your birthright was to die as a child! Cast out on a frozen rock. If I had not taken you in, you would not be here now to hate me” ( _Thor: The Dark World_ ). This is a common tactic by abusers, particularly emotional abusers, to make their victims feel guilty for even existing in the first place, treating basic necessities (food, water, shelter, etc) as a kindness on the abuser’s part. This is emphasized by Odin telling Loki “Frigga is the only reason you’re still alive, and you will never see her again” ( _Thor: The Dark World_ ). This becomes viciously real when Frigga dies and Loki isn’t allowed to attend her funeral, only finding out through one of the guards that she died. The results of this trauma are evident as well, with Thor visiting Loki and finding him sitting on the floor of his cell, the things within it scattered and knocked over, Loki appearing in shambles. Despite the fact that Odin raised Loki and was the cause of much of Loki’s trauma, Odin still seems to take no responsibility for his actions, much like he did not take responsibility for the way he raised and trained Hela as Goddess of Death.

In addition to abuse by Odin, we also see Loki’s trauma in having wanted Thor as his brother, and constantly feeling like he’s overshadowed by his brother’s accomplishments, as well as Thor believing that Loki will never be able to change to be a good person. In _Thor (2011)_ , when Thor returns to Asgard, Loki challenges him to fight, yelling at him “I never wanted the throne, I only ever wanted to be your equal!” ( _Thor_ ). In large part due to Odin’s abuse, Loki feels like he’s ignored or his accomplishments diminished when compared to Thor’s, and doesn’t feel like he’ll ever be as good as Thor, a situation that is once again reminiscent of Nebula and Gamora’s relationship and the effect of Thanos’ abuse on their relationship. While Gamora and Nebula eventually seem to connect and bond a lot more later, this doesn’t appear to happen for Loki and Thor, as appears evident in a conversation between them in _Thor: Ragnarok (2017)_ , as Thor is about to leave Sakaar and go back to help Asgard:

> Loki: Here's the thing. I'm probably better off staying here on Sakaar.  
>    
>  Thor: That's exactly what I was thinking.  
>    
>  Loki: ...Did you just agree with me?  
>    
>  Thor: This place is perfect for you. It's savage, chaotic, lawless. Brother, you're going to do great here.  
>    
>  Loki: Do you truly think so little of me?  
>    
>  Thor: Loki, I thought the world of you. I thought we were going to fight side-by-side forever, but at the end of the day you're you and I'm me and... oh, maybe there's still good in you but... let's be honest, our paths diverged a long time ago.  
>    
>  Loki: [emotional] Yeah... it's probably for the best that we'll never see each other again.  
>    
>  Thor: That's what you always wanted.  
>   
>  ( _Thor: Ragnarok_ )

This scene is telling in that Loki wants to repair their relationship, but doesn’t appear to know how to be the first to reach out, and is potentially afraid of being rejected if he does try to build that relationship again. He expects Thor to disagree with him, and is surprised when Thor tells him that they aren’t the same, and probably never will be, leaving Loki feeling that he shouldn’t try to repair their relationship, that it would be better for him to stick to what he knows best rather than trying to change. Thor doesn’t seem to realize the significance of their conversation, or notice the change in Loki’s behavior and demeanor that reveal more of what Loki is actually thinking and feeling.


	30. Thor (and a little more about Loki)

Odin also abuses Thor, which we see in _Thor (2011)_ when he abandons Thor on Earth with no explanation of how to return home or become worthy of Mjölnir again, when Thor’s entire personality was built on what he learned during childhood from his father in the first place. Similar to the way Odin had raised Hela to obsess over being the Goddess of Death and conquering other worlds, Odin raises Thor to obsess over the idea of being king, and he also seems to encourage Thor’s bold, brash personality, telling him not to seek out battle yet spending time in Thor’s childhood regaling him with stories about Odin’s past battles. When Thor goes to Jotunheim to attack the Frost Giants, rather than trying to make an active effort as both Thor’s father and king of Asgard to help Thor understand why that wasn’t a reasonable decision, he banishes Thor to Earth, with no explanation of how to become worthy again or what Thor needs to do while on Earth, leaving Thor stranded and confused on Earth by himself.

We also see in _Thor: The Dark World (2013)_ that Odin has double standards for Loki and Thor, telling Loki that Asgardians are practically equals to humans, yet telling Thor that Asgardians are above humans and that humans are insignificant in comparison. When Loki mentions ruling over humanity as their god, Odin yells at him “We are not gods! We're born, we live, we die, just as humans do” ( _Thor: The Dark World_ ). However, when Odin is talking to Thor a little later about Thor and Jane’s relationship, Odin tells him “Human lives are fleeting, they’re nothing. You’d be better served by what lies in front of you” ( _Thor: The Dark World_ ). Treating one person like they are incapable of doing anything right or like they are always at fault while treating another person like they are incapable of doing anything wrong or like they are always right is another common tactic by abusers to gaslight their victims, to make their victims dependent on their validation and approval in one way or another. These conflicting messages also show that Odin does not have Loki or Thor’s best interests at heart, but that he is willing to change his own values to fit what he wants his sons to do.

In _Thor: The Dark World (2013)_ , we see Thor mourn Frigga’s death, in _Thor: Ragnarok (2017)_ , we see Thor mourn Odin’s death, and in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , we see Thor mourn Loki’s death, realizing that Loki was the last family he had alive and leaving Thor feeling more alone than ever, even saying “What more can I lose?” ( _Avengers: Infinity War_ ). After each of these losses, Thor seems to grieve their loss, but then he quickly seems to move on, dealing with each of their deaths in greater stride than seems reasonable. Since not a lot of time is devoted to any of these traumas, there’s not a lot that can be said, other than to say that Thor’s grief and trauma seems to be severely understated in each of these cases.

After the events of _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ , Thor Odinson feels guilty for his failure to kill Thanos, and in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , when he believes his failure to have been permanent, he isolates himself and chooses to try and forget everything that’s happened. When Bruce Banner and Rocket try to talk to Thor to get his help with their new plan to reverse the snap, they find him in New Asgard, where Thor is hiding out in a cabin with Korg and Miek, now overweight with his hair and beard unkempt and spending his time eating, drinking alcohol, and yelling at other players on Fortnite. When they say Thanos’ name, Thor becomes agitated, telling them not to say that name, and he tells them that he has no intention of facing Thanos again. Once again, we see a character with classic PTSD symptoms, this time with Thor experiencing almost every symptom of PTSD: emotional distress and physical reactivity after being reminded of the trauma, avoidance of trauma reminders, overly negative thoughts and assumptions about himself, exaggerated blame of himself, self isolation, decreased interest in activities and difficulty experiencing positive emotions, irritability and aggression, risky or self destructive behavior, and difficulty concentrating. This time, rather than refusing to mention Thor’s trauma, the movie instead uses Thor’s weight gain as a result of his reactions to trauma for comedic effect, often making fun of Thor’s weight gain, his unkempt appearance, and his drunkenness. They even go so far as to make light of him having a panic attack when he and Rocket are on 2013 Asgard, with Rocket slapping him and telling him to pull himself together. With the way Thor’s PTSD is laughed at in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , one starts to actually prefer the way other characters’ PTSD was simply not discussed, because at least their trauma isn’t trivialized as “comedy.”


	31. Clint Barton

In _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we see Clint mourn the loss of his family in the beginning of the movie, then later mourn Natasha’s death when she chooses to sacrifice herself so Clint can go home to his family. Both traumas are fairly accurate depictions of trauma, with Clint grieving and reacting with anger and denial, first becoming Ronin the assassin after the deaths of his family and then yelling at Thor after Natasha’s self-sacrifice. We see Clint attacking a Japanese drug cartel, with the cartel leader asking why Clint is trying to kill him. Clint replies “You survived. Half the planet didn’t. They got Thanos. You get me” ( _Avengers: Endgame_ ). This is a great example of Clint, angry and grieving, choosing to kill the people he believes are the problem with the world as a way of coping with the fact that his family is gone, of feeling as if he’s doing something productive. While killing these people won’t bring his family back, it gives Clint a false sense of security and clarity, of having a specific job to do. Later, after Natasha’s sacrifice, there’s a conversation between Clint and Thor:

> Clint Barton: We can't bring her back.  
>    
>  Thor: I'm sorry, no offence, but you're a very earthly being, okay, and we're talking about space magic. It can seem very difficult...  
>    
>  Clint Barton: Yeah, look, I know I'm way outside my pay rate here, but she's still dead, isn't she? It can't be undone! Or, at least that's what the red floating guy had to say! Maybe you ought to go talk to him! Okay, go grab your hammer, and you find and talk to him! It was supposed to be me. Sacrificed her life for that goddamned stone, she put her life on it.
> 
> ( _Avengers: Endgame_ )

We see Clint lashing out at Thor, because while he’s more mad at himself for what happened, projecting his anger at Thor allows him to do something with all the anger and grief that he feels. This is a common reaction to grief, and it’s done wonderfully in _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , including the post-funeral scene in which Clint is talking to Wanda about Natasha and Vision, and how he wishes that he could let Natasha know that they won.

Another huge trauma of Clint’s that gets completely ignored on screen is his childhood with a physically abusive, alcoholic father in the Earth-616 comics, and how, as a result of this abuse, Clint’s hearing ranged from hard of hearing to profoundly deaf, with Clint shown later in life as knowing American Sign Language (ASL). Much like the exclusion of Bruce’s childhood trauma, excluding Clint’s childhood excludes the chance for children and adults alike to see the reality of trauma and abuse represented on screen. Unfortunately, because Clint’s childhood hasn’t been discussed in any detail whatsoever in the MCU, it’s difficult to provide any in-depth analysis here, and the most that can be reasonably concluded is that Clint’s character has been repeatedly underdeveloped and undervalued in the MCU, and as a result his character often feels bland and unimportant in comparison to the other heroes on the Avengers team, excluding the possibility of further discussion about traumas and experiences that could be represented.


	32. Peter Parker

In _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we see Peter Parker mourning Tony’s death, though we don’t get a lot of insight into this as it takes place near the end of the film, and the focus is more drawn to Pepper and Morgan’s reactions to Tony’s death. Once again, there isn’t much screen time dedicated to this, so there isn’t a lot that can be discussed, but what is shown is Peter with Tony just before Tony dies, saying “Mr. Stark, can you hear me? It’s Peter! We won, Mr. Stark… We won. You did it, Sir, you did it! Mr. Stark?” ( _Avengers: Endgame_ ). At this point, we no longer see Peter’s reaction to Tony’s death, other than his presence at the funeral. However, this initial reaction is a reasonable representation of losing someone. In that scene, we saw Pepper, Rhodey, and Peter all standing there with Tony, and each of them has a different but equally realistic reaction to Tony dying. Pepper is comforting and gentle, trying to make Tony’s last moments as warm and loving as possible. Rhodey is silent, likely as a result of not knowing what to say. Peter, on the other hand, is visibly upset, clearly in denial that Tony is dying. In this scene, we see three very different reactions to loss, and each one of them is well represented on screen.


	33. Morgan Stark

In _Avengers: Endgame (2019)_ , we also see Morgan Stark’s reaction to Tony’s death. Morgan, Tony and Pepper’s daughter, is between four and five years old at the time of Tony’s death. As a result, she doesn’t appear to grieve in the way everyone else does. This is likely due to her age, and her inability to process what death means. An article on the age at which children begin to understand death states that:

> Children begin to grasp death’s finality around age 4. [...] The other two aspects of death are learned a bit later, usually between age 5 and 7. One, dubbed ‘nonfunctionality’, is the idea that a dead body can no longer do things that a living body can do. [...] Then there’s death’s most befuddling attribute [...]: its universality. Every living thing dies, every plant, every animal, every person. Each one of us will someday expire. (Hughes)

While Morgan may understand death’s finality, she may not fully understand death, and therefore is not experiencing the grief everyone else around her is experiencing. This fits with the reality of how children generally process death, and is a good reflection of this trauma in a young child. Hopefully, if Morgan is featured in more films in the MCU as she grows up, we’ll see her reaction to Tony’s death continue to grow and change.


	34. Thanos

In the riskiest move of this analysis piece, I’m also going to talk about Thanos, the trauma of losing his homeworld, Titan, due to resource depletion, as he discusses in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_ and him sacrificing Gamora in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_. I should preface here that, trauma or not, there is no justification for Thanos’ actions. The trauma that someone does or does not have is no excuse for one’s actions, and this obviously goes to include the murder of half of all life. But you’ve come this far in this paper with me already, so I hope you’ll bear with me. The trauma of watching those around you die, particularly when you feel at least in some way responsible for not having done more, can motivate people to take drastic measures to try and prevent something like that from happening again, and this is certainly what we see in Thanos’ case. Killing off half of all life was not a good way to go about this, but it was the route that Thanos saw best in his desperation to try and prevent other planets from meeting the same fate as Titan did.

The other trauma related to Thanos is him sacrificing Gamora for the Soul Stone in _Avengers: Infinity War (2018)_. Considering what he believed was at stake, he felt that he had no choice but to sacrifice Gamora for the greater good, but he also loved her and did not want her to die. There is an important point I want to make here as well, and one that ties back into the beginning of this essay a little bit with Tony and Howard, which is that an abuser’s own feelings or intentions do not change the trauma they’ve caused their victims. So, while Thanos may have loved Gamora, he still certainly abused and used her as a weapon and a means to an end rather than treating her as an actual living being, not to mention having killed her family and taken her from her home planet as a child without any explanation or remorse or regard for what Gamora wanted. Him abusing Gamora should not be forgiven because he loved her. Intentions do not change the effects of abuse. Intentions and history can explain behavior, but they cannot excuse behavior.


	35. Final Thoughts/Conclusion

One theme that’s come up a lot in this paper is the acknowledgment that while it makes sense within the universe itself that people don’t trust the word of abuse and trauma victims/survivors, it does a disservice to victims/survivors because it makes the victim/survivor on screen look like they’re at fault. Now, with a claim like this, many may wonder, but what can be done to correct that problem when, as stated, it makes sense from the point of view of the other characters themselves? At this point, I’d like to propose my own solution: show flashbacks, or provide a chance for the audience to see the truth, even if the actual characters don’t necessarily get this same perspective. For example, a cut scene to a memory or past event can be powerful; it can show us the reality of what happened, untainted from the perspective of one of the characters in the present-day scene. This allows the audience to see the truth of the abuse or trauma survivor’s perspective, while still allowing for the fact that the characters themselves would not have realistically shared this information in-universe.

I’m well aware that there will be those who believe that discussing these things on screen in a superhero movie, or in any PG-13 movie, is unacceptable, scandalous, or even scarring to children, and that it would be unreasonable to expect movies to include such details, to any level of detail from graphic to completely non-graphic. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I do implore people to consider this: if you are not willing to tell a character’s story, why bother making a movie for them in the first place? If you are not willing to let children see that abuse and trauma is wrong, how are children who are currently being abused or traumatized going to find out that what they’re experiencing isn’t okay? How are children who are currently being abused or traumatized going to explain why they’re so scared and hurt? Because as much as we’d like to hope that we would notice the pain of those around us, often, child abuse and trauma victims go years without getting the help they need.

The other important reason to have characters’ trauma shown on screen is the same reason that it’s important to have people of color, LGBT and queer people, and disabled people on screen: representation. I’m a physically and psychiatrically disabled, mixed race, nonbinary queer person, and I cannot begin to tell you the importance of representation to me personally, let alone to the many other people I know who rarely get represented in media. It’s hard to explain the flood of emotions I felt when I watched _Iron Man 3 (2013)_ and saw Tony Stark having a panic attack. For the first time in my life, I had words to put on the weird feeling I had sometimes when I cried, the way that I felt like I was going to have a heart attack but couldn’t explain what was wrong with me, the way that I felt like I couldn’t breathe and couldn’t think straight. I finally had a name for it: anxiety attack. I can’t explain the flood of emotions I had the first time I was introduced to the terms “transgender,” “bisexual,” “fibromyalgia,” “scoliosis,” “nonbinary,” “queer,” “PTSD,” “borderline personality disorder (BPD).” It was like realizing that, after years and years of suffering, I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t imagining things. I wasn’t making things up. I wasn’t over exaggerating how hard it was for me to walk, how hard it was for me to be in public without flinching every time someone came up behind me, how hard it was for me to be called by the pronouns I was supposed to identify with, how hard it was for me to understand why I couldn’t like someone of a certain gender. Representation matters. It’s how we see ourselves in media, it’s how we see what “normal” people look like. And when we exclude any type of person from being a certain type of character, we exclude that type of person from feeling like they’re allowed to exist, from feeling like their experience is real or normal. By ignoring diversity in fiction, we are ignoring diversity in real life; we are telling the audience that we think that a certain type of diversity just “doesn’t happen” in that universe, that we think that type of diversity has no place in that universe, or this one, for that matter, that it’s too much of a burden to include people “like that.” And in a universe like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, where aliens, super-soldiers, and people mutated by gamma radiation exist, it says a lot about what is considered a “burden” or “unrealistic” to include.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has done a great many things that other studios and fictional universes have yet to accomplish; they’ve created extended, cohesive storylines, a large framework of characters, timelines, and realities, and have brought together fans from around the world who have loved and supported the characters and the people involved in this universe over the last eleven years. However, like any media, they aren’t perfect, and one of the biggest flaws has been their lack of acknowledgement and representation of trauma and its effects on those who have experienced it. As a fan of the MCU myself, as well as a victim of various kinds of abuse and trauma, I can certainly say that there are things I wish the MCU had done differently and storylines, plots, and issues I wish they had dealt with more respectfully and more in depth, even if I enjoyed the stories as they were. I’m reminded of the quote from Shuri in _Black Panther (2018)_ : “Just because something works doesn't mean that it cannot be improved.” The MCU has accomplished many extraordinary feats; I hope that in the future, better trauma representation can become another of their many accomplishments.


	36. Works Cited

Works Cited

_Ant-Man_. Directed by Peyton Reed, performances by Michael Douglas, Evangeline Lilly, and Paul Rudd, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2015.

_Ant-Man and the Wasp_. Directed by Peyton Reed, performances by Michael Douglas, Hannah John-Kamen, Evangeline Lilly, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Paul Rudd, Marvel Studios, 2018.

Arabi, Shahida. “5 Signs You’re In A Dangerous Trauma Bond With A Toxic Person.” _Thought Catalog_. 24 April 2018, [ https://thoughtcatalog.com/shahida-arabi/2018/04/5-signs-youre-in-a-destructive-trauma-bond-with-a-toxic-person/ ](https://thoughtcatalog.com/shahida-arabi/2018/04/5-signs-youre-in-a-destructive-trauma-bond-with-a-toxic-person/). Accessed 3 May 2019.

_The Avengers_. Directed by Joss Whedon, performances by Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Samuel L. Jackson, Mark Ruffalo, and Tom Hiddleston, Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures, 2012.

_Avengers: Age of Ultron_. Directed by Joss Whedon, performances by Robert Downey Jr., Elizabeth Olsen, Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Jeremy Renner, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and James Spader, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2015.

_Avengers: Endgame_. Directed by Joe Russo and Anthony Russo, performances by John Slattery, Robert Downey Jr., Paul Rudd, Chris Evans, Karen Gillan, Scarlett Johansson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Tom Holland, Lexi Rabe, Don Cheadle, Sebastian Stan, Hayley Atwell, Anthony Mackie, Mark Ruffalo, Jeremy Renner, Elizabeth Olsen, Josh Brolin, Zoe Saldana, Chadwick Boseman, Danai Gurira, Chris Pratt, Bradley Cooper, Chris Hemsworth, and Tessa Thompson, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2019.

_Avengers: Infinity War_. Directed by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo, performances by Danai Gurira, Chadwick Boseman, Josh Brolin, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Dave Bautista, Chris Pratt, Pom Klementieff, Karen Gillan, Robert Downey Jr., Ross Marquand, Bradley Cooper, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Tom Holland, Benedict Cumberbatch, Mark Holland, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Sebastian Stan, Marvel Studios, 2018.

_Black Panther_. Directed by Ryan Coogler, performances by Chadwick Boseman, John Kani, Michael B. Jordan, Daniel Kaluuya, Andy Serkis, Letitia Wright, Angela Bassett, Danai Gurira, and Lupita Nyong’o, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2018.

_Captain America: Civil War_. Directed by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo, performances by Robert Downey Jr., Don Cheadle, Chris Evans, Sebastian Stan, Chadwick Boseman, Emily VanCamp, Hayley Atwell, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Jeremy Renner, John Kani, Scarlett Johansson, and Daniel Brühl, Marvel Studios, 2016.

_Captain America: The First Avenger_. Directed by Joe Johnston, performances by Chris Evans, Sebastian Stan, and Hayley Atwell, Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment, 2011.

_Captain America: The Winter Soldier_. Directed by Joe Russo and Anthony Russo, performances by Chris Evans, Sebastian Stan, Hayley Atwell, Emily VanCamp, and Anthony Mackie, Marvel Entertainment, 2014.

_Captain Marvel_. Directed by Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, performances by Brie Larson, Lashana Lynch, Jude Law, Samuel L. Jackson, and Ben Mendelsohn, Walt Disney Pictures and Marvel Studios, 2019.

_Doctor Strange_. Directed by Scott Derrickson, performances by Rachel McAdams and Benedict Cumberbatch, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2016.

“DSM-5 Criteria for PTSD.” _BrainLine_. [ https://www.brainline.org/article/dsm-5-criteria-ptsd ](https://www.brainline.org/article/dsm-5-criteria-ptsd). Accessed 3 May 2019.

_Guardians of the Galaxy_. Directed by James Gunn, performances by Dave Bautista, Lee Pace, Josh Brolin, Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Bradley Cooper, Michael Rooker, Laura Haddock, Gregg Henry, Vin Diesel, and Benicio Del Toro, Marvel Studios, 2014.

_Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2_. Directed by James Gunn, performances by Chris Pratt, Kurt Russell, Zoe Saldana, Laura Haddock, Michael Rooker, Karen Gillan, and Bradley Cooper, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2017.

Hughes, Virginia. “When Do Kids Understand Death?” _National Geographic_. 26 July 2013. [ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2013/07/26/when-do-kids-understand-death/ ](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2013/07/26/when-do-kids-understand-death/). Accessed 5 May 2019.

_Incredible Hulk_. Directed by Louis Leterrier, Universal Pictures and Marvel Enterprises, 2008.

_Iron Man_. Directed by Jon Favreau, performances by Robert Downey Jr. Gwyneth Paltrow, Shaun Toub, and Jeff Bridges, Paramount Pictures and Marvel Enterprises, 2008.

_Iron Man 2_. Directed by Jon Favreau, performances by Robert Downey Jr., Samuel L. Jackson, John Slattery, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, and Mickey Rourke, Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment, 2010.

_Iron Man 2: Public Identity_. By Barry Kitson, Justin Theroux, and Joe Casey, illustrated by Barry Kitson, Marvel Digital Comics, 2010.

_Iron Man 3_. Directed by Shane Black, performances by Robert Downey Jr., Paul Bettany, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Ty Simpkins, Jon Favreau, Glenn Foster, Guy Pearce, and Rebecca Hall, Marvel Studios, 2013.

Madigan, Tim. “Their war ended 70 years ago. Their trauma didn’t.” _The Washington Post_. 11 September 2015. [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-greatest-generations-forgotten-trauma/2015/09/11/8978d3b0-46b0-11e5-8ab4-c73967a143d3_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cddd93bcbe43 ](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-greatest-generations-forgotten-trauma/2015/09/11/8978d3b0-46b0-11e5-8ab4-c73967a143d3_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cddd93bcbe43). Accessed 5 May 2019.

Rux. “Bucky’s Arm Theory, AKA Me Screaming Into The Abyss.” 6 December 2018. Accessed 5 May 2019.

Schubert, Carla C. and Raija-Leena Punamäki. “Torture and PTSD: Prevalence, Sequelae, Protective Factors, and Therapy.” _Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015_. 2015. [ https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/978-3-319-08613-2_65-1.pdf ](https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/978-3-319-08613-2_65-1.pdf). Accessed 5 May 2019.

_Spider-Man: Homecoming_. Directed by Jon Watts, performances by Robert Downey Jr., Tom Holland, Jon Favreau, and Gwyneth Paltrow, Columbia Pictures and Marvel Studios, 2017.

Trott, Tony. “Don’t Say ‘Wheelchair Bound.’” _New Mobility_. 4 September 2015. [ http://www.newmobility.com/2015/09/dont-say-wheelchair-bound/ ](http://www.newmobility.com/2015/09/dont-say-wheelchair-bound/). Accessed 8 May 2019.

_Thor_. Directed by Kenneth Branagh, performances by Tom Hiddleston, Chris Hemsworth, and Anthony Hopkins, Paramount Pictures and Marvel Entertainment, 2011.

_Thor: The Dark World_. Directed by Alan Taylor, performances by Tom Hiddleston, Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Rene Russo, and Anthony Hopkins, Marvel Studios and Walt Disney Pictures, 2013.

_Thor: Ragnarok._  Directed by Taika Waititi, performances by Tessa Thompson, Cate Blanchett, Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, and Anthony Hopkins, Walt Disney Pictures and Marvel Studios, 2017.

 


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